Product Manager – Perception & Sensor Fusion

Helsing; München; On-site; EUR 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Salary + VSOP options

Relocation support

Learning allowance

Health & wellness benefits

Social events and allowances

Enhanced parental leave

Remote work option during pregnancy

Job summary

Helsing seeks a Product Manager (Air) for Perception & Sensor Fusion to own the vision and roadmap for our airborne perception software stack. You will guide requirements, KPIs and prioritised deliverables across EO/IR, RF processing and data fusion, partnering with engineers and flight test teams.

You will translate demanding mission needs into clear specifications and collaborate with systems, navigation and safety teams to ensure operational value for next‑generation European unmanned

Qualifications

• Experience as a product manager, technical product owner or systems architect in aerospace/defence, autonomous systems or robotics.
• Ability to translate operational needs into structured requirements, metrics and roadmaps.
• Strong communication with engineers, programme leaders, customers and military stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Own the product strategy and roadmap for airborne perception systems (EO/IR, RF).
• Translate operational needs into requirements, KPIs and acceptance criteria for engineering and flight test.
• Collaborate with perception, fusion, autonomy and navigation teams on architecture and trade-offs.
• Define how perception outputs support mission autonomy and shared situational awareness.
• Shape test and evidence strategies across simulation and flight test campaigns.
• Develop data strategy with ML and infrastructure teams for data collection and synthetic data.
• Engage with customers and partners to gather feedback and demonstrate roadmap value.

Skills

Product management

Aerospace/defence domain

Requirements engineering

Stakeholder communication

Travel readiness

Job description

Who We Are

Helsing is a defence AI company. Our mission is to protect our democracies. We aim to achieve technological leadership, so that open societies can continue to make sovereign decisions and control their ethical standards.

Who We Are

Helsing is a defence AI company. Our mission is to protect our democracies. We aim to achieve technological leadership, so that open societies can continue to make sovereign decisions and control their ethical standards. As democracies, we believe we have a special responsibility to be thoughtful about the development and deployment of powerful technologies like AI. We take this responsibility seriously. We are an ambitious and committed team of engineers, AI specialists and customer-facing programme managers. We are looking for mission-driven people to join our European teams - and apply their skills to solve the most complex and impactful problems. We embrace an open and transparent culture that welcomes healthy debates on the use of technology in defence, its benefits, and its ethical implications.

The role

As Product Manager (Air) - Perception & Sensor Fusion, you will define what our uncrewed combat aerial vehicle sees, understands and shares. You will own the product vision and roadmap for the full perception software stack, spanning electro-optical and electromagnetic sensor processing, data fusion from single sensors to collaborative multi-aircraft operations, the common operating picture, and perception-based navigation in GNSS-denied environments. Working with operational users, software and AI engineers, systems engineers and flight test teams, you will translate demanding mission needs into clear requirements, measurable performance targets and a prioritised roadmap, and you will see your decisions travel from whiteboard to flight test. By giving aircraft and operators a reliable, trustworthy picture of the battlespace, you will shape a core capability of a next-generation European uncrewed combat aircraft and directly strengthen the ability of European armed forces to deter and defend, with humans firmly in control.

The day-to-day

• Own the product strategy and roadmap for airborne perception, covering EO/IR and RF sensor processing, multi-level data fusion, situational awareness and perception-aided navigation, so that every release maps to a defined operational capability
• Translate operational needs, mission threads and customer requirements into product requirements, measurable KPIs and acceptance criteria that engineering and flight test can verify
• Work closely with perception, fusion, autonomy and navigation engineers to resolve architecture-level trade-offs across performance, latency, bandwidth, SWaP and schedule
• Define how perception outputs and the common operating picture serve mission autonomy, collaborative operations and the human operator, including how uncertainty is represented and communicated
• Partner with systems engineering, flight test and safety teams to shape test and evidence strategies, from simulation and hardware-in-the-loop to flight test campaigns
• Shape the perception data strategy with data and ML infrastructure teams, including collection campaigns, simulation and synthetic data needs
• Work directly with customers, operational users and partners to gather feedback and run demonstrations, keeping the roadmap anchored in real-world operational value

You should apply if you

• Have shipped sensing, perception or data fusion capabilities as a product manager, technical product owner or systems architect, ideally in aerospace, defence, autonomous vehicles or robotics
• Understand sensor data processing (EO/IR and/or RF, radar, ESM), multi-target tracking and multi-sensor data fusion in depth
• Have taken a complex capability from requirements through integration and test into the field or into flight
• Turn ambiguous operational or customer needs into structured requirements, metrics and a prioritised roadmap, and decide clearly what not to build
• Communicate clearly and credibly with engineers, programme leaders, customers and senior military stakeholders, in writing and in person
• Are eligible to obtain national security clearance and can travel to test sites, customers and partners

Note: We operate in an industry where women, as well as other minority groups, are systematically under‑represented. We encourage you to apply even if you don’t meet all the listed qualifications; ability and impact cannot be summarised in a few bullet points.

Nice to have

• Have worked on collaborative or distributed fusion across multiple platforms, including operation under constrained or intermittent datalinks
• Understand perception‑aided navigation, such as visual, image‑based or terrain‑referenced navigation, and navigation integrity in GNSS‑degraded environments
• Know military aviation, ISR or electronic warfare, for example through industry work or service as aircrew, WSO or EW/ISR officer
• Understand tactical data links, C2 interfaces and common operating picture concepts, such as Link 16 and NATO standards
• Have worked within airworthiness, safety and certification processes for airborne software, such as DO‑178C
• Have hands‑on experience of ML‑based perception, simulation or synthetic data for training and validation
• Have worked with European defence customers and procurement agencies, such as BAAINBw

Join Helsing and work with world‑leading experts in their fields

• Helsing's work is important. You'll be directly contributing to the protection of democratic countries while balancing both ethical and geopolitical concerns
• The work is unique. We operate in a domain that has highly unusual technical requirements and constraints, and where robustness, safety, and ethical considerations are vital. You will face unique engineering and AI challenges that make a meaningful impact in the world
• Our work frequently takes us right up to the state of the art in technical innovation, be it reinforcement learning, distributed systems, generative AI, or deployment infrastructure. The defence industry is entering the most exciting phase of the technological development curve. Advances in our field of work are not incremental: Helsing is part of, and often leading, historic leaps forward
• In our domain, success is a matter of order‑of‑magnitude improvements and novel capabilities. This means we take bets, aim high, and focus on big opportunities. Despite being a relatively young company, Helsing has already been selected for multiple significant government contracts
• We actively encourage healthy, proactive, and diverse debate internally about what we do and how we choose to do it. Teams and individual engineers are trusted (and encouraged) to practise responsible autonomy and critical thinking, and to focus on outcomes, not conformity. At Helsing you will have a say in how we (and you!) work, the opportunity to engage on what does and doesn't work, and to take ownership of aspects of our culture that you care deeply about

What We Offer

• Competitive salary and VSOP options
• Relocation support: up to €2,500 and 4 weeks temporary accommodation
• Learning: €500/£450 yearly allowance
• Health & wellness: gym membership and mental health support (Nilo.health)
• Social: regularly company events and monthly social allowances
• Enhanced parental leave: 22 weeks fully paid for primary caregivers & 6 weeks for secondary caregivers.
• Family support: 5 days of paid family emergency leave, 100% remote work option during pregnancy and phased return to work

These are the core benefits across all locations, there may be additional benefits in certain locations.

Helsing is an equal opportunities employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability or gender identity. Please do not submit personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, data concerning your health, or data concerning your sexual orientation.

Helsing's Candidate Privacy and Confidentiality Regime can be found here.