Shield AI is hiring a Field Solutions Engineer, Hivemind to support technical sales, customer engagements, demonstrations, and capture activities for Hivemind, Shield AI’s autonomy solution for intelligent, mission-capable unmanned systems.
Hivemind enables autonomous operation across complex mission environments, allowing aircraft and other robotic systems to perceive, decide, coordinate, and execute with reduced operator burden. This role will serve as a customer-facing technical expert for Hivemind, helping defense and security customers understand how autonomy can solve operational problems, improve mission outcomes, and integrate into existing and future force structures.
The Field Solutions Engineer will translate customer mission needs, CONOPs, operational constraints, and platform integration considerations into credible, technically feasible Hivemind solution concepts. This includes supporting customer discovery, technical briefings, demonstrations, RFIs, RFPs, white papers, technical interchange meetings, and customer-specific solution development.
Success requires technical credibility, strong communication, product truth, and the ability to connect Hivemind’s autonomy capabilities to real customer missions across varied operational environments.
What you'll do:
- Serve as a customer-facing technical expert for Hivemind autonomy solutions in markets.
- Support customer discovery, technical briefings, demonstrations, technical interchange meetings, and capture activities.
- Translate customer mission needs, CONOPs, operational objectives, and integration constraints into credible Hivemind solution concepts.
- Partner with Business Development and Capture teams to support RFIs, RFPs, proposals, white papers, demos, and customer-facing technical narratives.
- Explain Hivemind autonomy capabilities, limitations, roadmap considerations, and integration requirements to technical, operational, commercial, and leadership audiences.
- Develop and maintain technical sales assets, including capability briefs, demo scripts, solution templates, FAQs, technical white papers, and customer-specific briefing materials.
- Work closely with Product, Engineering, Customer Engagement, and Program teams to represent customer requirements, technical risks, roadmap gaps, and field feedback.
- Help customers evaluate how autonomy can support operational effectiveness, mission planning, force modernization, and fielded mission outcomes.
- Maintain strong product truth by ensuring customer-facing materials and discussions accurately reflect current capabilities, constraints, and roadmap timing.
- Monitor relevant developments in autonomy, AI, unmanned systems, mission software, and defense technology to inform customer conversations and product feedback.
- Build trusted relationships with customer technical stakeholders and internal cross-functional partners.
- Operate independently across complex customer engagements while keeping internal stakeholders aligned and informed.
Required qualifications:
- 7+ years of experience in solutions engineering, field applications engineering, systems engineering, technical sales, autonomy, robotics, defense software, aerospace, or related technical customer-facing roles.
- Strong technical understanding of autonomy, AI-enabled systems, mission software, unmanned systems, robotics, or complex defense technology systems.
- Experience supporting customer-facing technical engagements such as demos, technical briefings, proposal support, integration discussions, technical interchange meetings, or operational workshops.
- Ability to translate customer mission needs into technically feasible solution concepts, requirements, demos, and product feedback.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical concepts to technical, operational, commercial, and leadership audiences.
- Ability to work cross-functionally with Business Development, Product Management, Engineering, Customer Engagement, and Program teams.
- Strong judgment in representing product capabilities, limitations, and roadmap dependencies to customers.
- Demonstrated ability to build trust with customers and internal stakeholders through technical credibility, responsiveness, and clear communication.
- Ability to manage ambiguity, prioritize competing demands, and execute independently in a fast-paced environment.
- Willingness and ability to travel for customer engagements, demonstrations, exercises, and internal meetings.
Preferred qualifications:
- Prior military, defense, aerospace, robotics, unmanned systems, or advanced technology domains (military or civilian).
- Direct experience working with U.S. Navy or U.S. Air Force customers, programs, or operational units, including familiarity with relevant mission sets, platforms, and acquisition processes.
- Experience with autonomous systems (air, ground, or maritime) and familiarity with autonomy workflows, mission planning, system integration, and operational evaluation.
- Hands-on experience with Python, C++, Linux, APIs, SDKs, autonomy software, robotics middleware, or technical prototyping.
- Demonstrated ability to create clear, reusable technical content that enables BD, customers, and internal stakeholders.
Skills Required
- 7+ years in solutions engineering, field applications, systems engineering, technical sales, autonomy, robotics, defense software, aerospace, or related customer-facing technical roles.
- Strong technical understanding of autonomy, AI-enabled systems, mission software, unmanned systems, or robotics.
- Experience supporting customer-facing technical engagements: demos, technical briefings, proposal support, integration discussions, or technical interchange meetings.
- Ability to translate customer mission needs into technically feasible solution concepts, requirements, demos, and product feedback.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills for technical, operational, commercial, and leadership audiences.
- Ability to work cross-functionally with Business Development, Product, Engineering, Customer Engagement, and Program teams.
- Strong judgment representing product capabilities, limitations, and roadmap dependencies to customers.
- Demonstrated ability to build trust with customers and internal stakeholders through technical credibility and responsiveness.
- Ability to manage ambiguity, prioritize competing demands, and execute independently in a fast-paced environment.
- Willingness and ability to travel for customer engagements, demonstrations, exercises, and internal meetings.
- Prior military, defense, aerospace, robotics, unmanned systems, or advanced technology domain experience.
- Direct experience with U.S. Navy or U.S. Air Force customers, programs, or operational units.
- Experience with autonomous systems and familiarity with autonomy workflows, mission planning, system integration, and operational evaluation.
- Hands-on experience with Python, C++, Linux, APIs, SDKs, autonomy software, robotics middleware, or technical prototyping.
- Demonstrated ability to create clear, reusable technical content for BD, customers, and internal stakeholders.
What the Team is Saying
Shield AI Compensation & Benefits Highlights
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Healthcare Strength — Healthcare coverage includes medical, dental, vision, and mental-health support, with company materials describing excellent coverage. Feedback suggests these offerings are comprehensive and consistently highlighted across official and third-party benefit lists.
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Equity Value & Accessibility — Equity is granted to all full-time hires, with RSU structures and tools like Carta Tax intended to improve understanding and tax timing. Feedback suggests this broad-based ownership approach is a notable component of total rewards.
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Parental & Family Support — Benefits include paid parental leave, fertility support, childcare benefits, family medical leave, and onsite resources such as a Mother's Room. Feedback suggests the family-oriented offerings are more expansive than basic coverage.
Shield AI Insights
What We Do
At Shield AI, you won't wait years to see your work reach the field. You'll build hardware and software that operates in the real world right now, in the hands of the people who depend on it. Hivemind, our AI pilot, has been flying since 2018. It has flown more than 30 platforms, including an F-16, and it now sits under a U.S. Air Force production contract for Collaborative Combat Aircraft. When you write code or shape a system here, you contribute to technology with a proven flight record and a clear production future. V-BAT flies intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions with an operational record that stretches from Ukraine to the Indo-Pacific. It delivers eyes where they matter most, in the most demanding conditions on earth. The teams behind it watch their work get tested where the stakes are real. X-BAT takes its first flight this year. It's an AI-piloted fighter that needs no runway, built to operate where traditional aircraft can't. Join now and you help shape a program at its earliest, most formative stage. That's the kind of ground-floor work that defines a career. Do the most impactful work of your life, on problems that matter. Autonomy at this level asks a lot of you. You'll take on problems in perception, planning, and control that few teams anywhere are equipped to solve. You'll work across disciplines, from aerospace and robotics to machine learning and systems engineering, alongside people who hold themselves to an exacting standard and expect the same from you. Our mission is clear: protect service members and civilians with intelligent systems. That purpose runs through every decision, every design review, and every deployment. It's why the work here carries a weight you can feel. Ready to join our mission? Explore our open roles and find where you fit.
Why Work With Us
Founded in 2015 by a former Navy SEAL, Shield AI builds AI pilots and uncrewed aircraft. Veterans aren't an afterthought here, they're at every level. It's why the work carries weight: AI pilots and uncrewed aircraft flying real missions, from Ukraine to the Indo-Pacific, protecting service members and civilians.
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