Autonomy Systems Engineer (Robotics & ROS2)

Forterra; Clarksburg (MD); On-site; USD 120,000 - 165,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Premium Healthcare Benefits

PTO 20 days per year

Parental leave (7 weeks)

Tuition reimbursement

401(k) plan with match

Holiday calendar

Disability insurance

Beer and beverages stocked

Job summary

Forterra is seeking a software engineer to design, develop, and field software solutions enabling intelligent behavior in robotics and autonomous systems for national security customers. You will support real‑world missions across a fleet of ground vehicles worldwide, collaborating with engineers, researchers, and product managers.

The role emphasizes integrating software on hardware, delivering production-quality code, and optimizing autonomy systems with a focus on cross-functional

Qualifications

• BS degree in CS/engineering/robotics or equivalent.
• Experience integrating software on hardware products.
• Strong programming skills in C++, Python, or Java.
• Ability to deliver production-quality software in a CI environment.
• Strong understanding of algorithms, data structures, and software design principles.
• Demonstrates clean, maintainable code and documentation practices.

Responsibilities

• Bring autonomy into real operations: Integrate and deploy our autonomy stack on customer-bound hardware platforms and validate it in real-world conditions.
• Build with users and stakeholders: Work across the organization and directly with end-users to deliver new behaviors, payload integrations, and emerging mission use-cases.
• Optimize the full system: Take a holistic view of autonomous vehicle behavior—how sensing, compute, controls, and other subsystems interact—and drive overall performance improvements.
• Close the loop from test to deploy: Analyze test results, identify issues and root causes, and collaborate with engineering teams to drive problems to resolution.
• Improve the core autonomy stack: Detect performance shortfalls, shape solution approaches, and implement enhancements in partnership with cross-functional teams.
• Connect product needs to R&D execution: Partner across business development and engineering teams to translate customer requirements into delivered autonomy capabilities.
• Travel: Travel ranging from 10-25% and 25-50% depending on candidate preference and role placement. Ability to commute to Arlington, VA as needed.

Skills

C++

Python

Java

Education

B.S. in computer science, engineering, robotics, or related field

Tools

ROS2

Embedded systems

Job description

Forterra is seeking a software engineer to design, develop, and field software solutions enabling intelligent behavior in robotics and autonomous systems for national security customers. You will support real‑world missions across a fleet of ground vehicles worldwide, collaborating with engineers, researchers, and product managers.

The role emphasizes integrating software on hardware, delivering production-quality code, and optimizing autonomy systems with a focus on cross-functional