Engineering Manager, Perception and Machine Learning

Drive Capital; Providence (RI); On-site; USD 140,000 - 200,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health Insurance

Life Insurance

401k (Matching)

Unlimited PTO

Equity Package

Work/Home Office Stipend

Global Entry

Parental Leave

Wellness stipend

Job summary

HavocAI is seeking an Engineering Manager, Perception & ML to lead a team developing perception and machine learning capabilities for autonomous systems. You will translate mission and product requirements into engineering priorities and drive execution across multiple interfaces, balancing technical leadership with people development.

You will collaborate with Autonomy, Embedded, Data, Simulation, Hardware, Product, Programs, and Field Operations, shaping architecture, training, and deployment

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in CS/ML/Robotics or related field.
• 7+ years engineering experience in perception, ML, CV, robotics, autonomy, or sensor fusion.
• 2+ years direct people-management in a highly technical environment.

Responsibilities

• Lead, manage, and develop a team of perception, ML, sensor fusion, and software engineers.
• Own team planning, prioritization, execution, and delivery against the Perception & ML roadmap.
• Establish clear goals and expectations for the team and hold engineers accountable for results.
• Guide architecture and technical decisions across CV, sensor fusion, tracking, detection, and ML-based scene understanding.
• Oversee model training, evaluation, data curation, validation, and deployment workflows.
• Ensure perception capabilities align with real-world performance, reliability, and field readiness.

Skills

Leadership

People management

Cross-functional collaboration

Strategic planning

Communication

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, ML, Robotics, Electrical/Computer Engineering

Tools

PyTorch

TensorRT

ONNX

CUDA

MLflow

Docker

Kubernetes

NVIDIA Jetson

Job description

About Us:

Havoc is a leader in all-domain collaborative autonomy. Its software-defined hardware approach powers military and commercial-grade autonomous systems across sea, air, and land to sense, decide, and act together in complex and contested environments. Havoc connects assets, enabling them to share information, adapt in real time, and continue operating even when communications are disrupted or denied. Havoc optimizes mission performance and minimizes human risk. Havoc was founded in 2024 and headquartered in Providence, Rhode Island. Learn more at Havoc: All-Domain Collaborative Autonomy .

About the Role

As the Engineering Manager, Perception & Machine Learning, you will lead the team responsible for developing the perception and machine learning capabilities that enable HavocAI's autonomous systems to understand and operate within the world around them.

This is a people leadership and technical management role for someone with a strong foundation in perception, machine learning, computer vision, sensor fusion, or robotics. You will be responsible for building and developing the team, setting priorities, driving execution, and ensuring perception capabilities move effectively from research and development into reliable, fielded products.

You’ll work closely with Autonomy, Embedded, Data, Simulation, Product, Programs, and Field Operations to translate mission and product requirements into clear engineering priorities. You should be comfortable balancing technical decisions, team development, execution, and changing priorities in a fast-moving environment.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead, manage, and develop a team of perception, machine learning, sensor fusion, and software engineers.


• Own team planning, prioritization, execution, and delivery against the Perception & ML roadmap.


• Establish clear goals, responsibilities, and expectations for the team and hold engineers accountable for results.


• Partner with senior technical contributors to guide architecture and technical decisions across computer vision, sensor fusion, tracking, detection, classification, segmentation, and related capabilities.


• Oversee development and maturation of model training, evaluation, data curation, validation, and deployment workflows.


• Ensure perception capabilities are designed around real-world performance, reliability, compute constraints, and field readiness.


• Partner cross-functionally with Autonomy, Embedded, Data, Simulation, Hardware, Product, Programs, and Field Operations.


• Translate customer, mission, and product requirements into clear engineering priorities and execution plans.


• Use field data, testing results, and operator feedback to prioritize improvements and address performance gaps.


• Establish effective engineering practices around design reviews, code reviews, testing, model evaluation, release readiness, and technical documentation.


• Identify execution risks, dependencies, resource constraints, and technical tradeoffs and communicate them clearly to engineering leadership.


• Coach and develop engineers through regular feedback, performance management, career development, and mentorship.


• Recruit, interview, onboard, and retain high-performing engineers as the team grows.


• Foster a culture of technical excellence, ownership, collaboration, and continuous improvement.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Robotics, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related technical field.


• 7+ years of relevant engineering experience in perception, machine learning, computer vision, robotics, autonomy, sensor fusion, or related fields.


• 2+ years of direct people-management experience, ideally managing engineers in a highly technical environment.


• Strong technical understanding of modern perception systems, including computer vision, sensor fusion, tracking, detection, classification, or ML-based scene understanding.


• Experience taking ML or perception capabilities from development through testing and deployment in real-world systems.


• Demonstrated ability to manage engineering priorities, technical roadmaps, dependencies, and delivery across multiple initiatives.


• Experience hiring, coaching, developing, and evaluating engineering talent.


• Strong cross-functional leadership skills and experience partnering with software, autonomy, data, hardware, product, and field teams.


• Ability to make sound decisions across technical performance, schedule, resources, risk, and product requirements.


• Strong communication skills with the ability to communicate technical issues and tradeoffs to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.


• High ownership, sound judgment, and comfort operating in fast-moving, ambiguous environments.


• U.S. citizenship and ability to obtain and maintain a security clearance.

Preferred Qualifications

• Advanced degree in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Robotics, Electrical Engineering, Computer Vision, or a related field.


• Previous experience managing a Perception, ML, Robotics, or Autonomy engineering team.


• Experience with robotics, autonomous vehicles, defense technology, aerospace, maritime systems, or other deployed autonomous systems.


• Experience with multimodal sensor systems including cameras, EO/IR, radar, LiDAR, AIS, GPS/INS, or IMU.


• Familiarity with PyTorch, TensorRT, ONNX, CUDA, MLflow, Docker, Kubernetes, NVIDIA Jetson, or similar ML and deployment technologies.


• Experience with simulation, synthetic data, annotation workflows, and large-scale perception datasets.


• Experience supporting field testing, customer demonstrations, operational evaluations, or deployed robotic systems.


• Experience supporting government or DoD programs.


• Active or prior security clearance.

Benefits

• 100% Employer paid Health, Dental and Vision Insurance for you and your families


• Life Insurance (Employer Paid)


• Ability to participate in the companies 401k program (Matching)


• Unlimited PTO policy with an enforced 2 week minimum


• Equity Package


• Work / Home Office Stipend


• Global Entry


• 16 Week Paid Parental Leave


• Monthly Health and Wellness Stipend

Our Values

• Innovation: We are driven to break new ground. Every day presents an opportunity to challenge the status quo, think boldly, and deliver advanced solutions that transform the future of defense technology.


• Integrity: We hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards, ensuring transparency, accountability, and trust in all our actions and partnerships.


• Mission-Driven: We are focused on achieving impactful outcomes that align with our core mission- protecting lives through innovation.


• Forward-Leaning: We continuously seek out new opportunities and remain at the forefront of technological advancements. We embrace change and anticipate the challenges of tomorrow with confidence and creativity.


• Ownership of All Tasks: At HavocAI, no problem is too complex or too trivial. We believe that greatness comes from tackling the hardest challenges, but also in handling the smallest, sometimes thankless, tasks with the same level of commitment and care.


• Servant Leadership: We lead by serving others, whether it’s supporting our employees, partners, or the broader community. Empowering those around us is key to achieving long-term success and making a lasting impact.

HavocAI is an Equal Opportunity Employer and is committed to creating an inclusive and diverse workplace. We welcome applicants from all backgrounds and do not discriminate based on race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, age, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other legally protected status.