Algorithm Engineer, Autonomous Driving Validation

Socket.dev; Houston, San Francisco (TX, CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Bot Auto in Houston is seeking a software engineer to keep the autonomy stack healthy, fast, and trustworthy. You will work across code maintenance, validation pipelines, and release gating to keep the platform reliable as it scales.

This role emphasizes building robust debugging and observability tools, collaborating with algorithm engineers and the simulation team to turn road cases into fixes and verifications, with a strong focus on CI and test infrastructure.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience in CS or related field.
• Strong C++ and Python programming, with testing and code-review discipline.
• Experience building or operating CI/validation/test infrastructure.
• Strong debugging: reproduce and root-cause issues across multi-component stack.

Responsibilities

• Own and improve core autonomy code with refactoring and performance tuning.
• Build and operate validation and regression pipeline.
• Improve simulation infrastructure for determinism and version pinning.
• Run the triage loop to reproduce and localize root cause.
• Build debugging and observability tooling for fast diagnosis.
• Collaborate with algorithm engineers and operations to shorten release path.

Skills

C++

Python

Testing

CI infrastructure

Education

B.S. in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Git

CI pipelines

Job description

Company Introduction

At Bot Auto, we are revolutionizing the transportation of goods with our cutting-edge autonomous trucks, enhancing the quality of life for communities around the globe. With the agility of a startup and the wisdom of seasoned experts, our team has achieved numerous world-firsts and unparalleled innovations. United by a shared vision, we create groundbreaking solutions that propel the future of transportation. Join us and transform your ideas into reality.

About The Role

You will be the engineer who keeps the autonomy stack healthy, fast, and trustworthy. This role spans code maintenance and platform quality, the validation and simulation pipeline that gates every release, and the triage-and-fix loop that turns reported road cases into resolved issues. If you take pride in a codebase that stays clean as it scales and a validation system that catches regressions before they reach the road, this is your role. The work is less about any single algorithm and more about the engineering backbone that lets the whole team move quickly without breaking things.

What You\'ll Do

• Own and improve core autonomy code: refactoring, interface hygiene, build and runtime performance, and day-to-day maintenance to keep a fast-growing codebase maintainable.
• Build and operate the validation and regression pipeline, including scenario suites, metric definitions, sim-vs-road consistency checks, and release-gating criteria.
• Improve simulation infrastructure: determinism, version pinning, scenario tooling, and diffing that makes the cause of a regression obvious.
• Run the triage loop: take cases reported from the road and from simulation, reproduce them, localize the root cause, and either fix them or route them to the right owner with a clear, actionable writeup.
• Build the debugging and observability tooling (logging, replay, per-frame snapshotting) that makes failures fast to diagnose.
• Partner with the algorithm engineers, the simulation team, and operations to keep the path from "case reported" to "fix verified" short and reliable.

Required Qualifications

• B.S. in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Strong C++ and Python, with sound instincts for testing, code review, and keeping a large codebase healthy.
• Experience building or operating CI/validation/test infrastructure for a complex software system.
• Strong debugging skills — comfortable reproducing and root-causing issues across an unfamiliar, multi-component stack.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with simulation, regression frameworks, or validation pipelines for robotics or autonomous systems.
• Experience with data and logging infrastructure (large-scale log replay, observability, debugging tooling).
• Familiarity with autonomy, robotics, or another real-time, safety-critical domain.
• Experience defining metrics and quality gates that engineering and product teams rely on for release decisions.