Lead Autonomous Vehicle Systems Test Engineer

Neura Market; Mountain View (CA); Hybrid; USD 196,000 - 242,000; Full time

Job summary

Waymo in Mountain View, California is seeking a Systems Test Engineer Lead to join the Systems Engineering team and help blend software and hardware testing disciplines for autonomous vehicle validation.

This hybrid role reports to the Systems Test Engineering Lead and emphasizes cross-functional collaboration with OEMs, early vehicle testing, and robust traceability to ensure safe, SDS-Ready software releases.

Qualifications

• Fluent in Japanese (N1 level or equivalent).
• Experience with physical hands-on testing of Autonomous Vehicles.
• Strong background in systems engineering, test engineering, or automotive validation.
• Demonstrated leadership with direct management of technical teams.
• Ability to navigate ambiguity and drive technical consensus.

Responsibilities

• Act as Waymo's test engineering representative across domains, helping partners develop test strategies for requirements, detailed test plans, scripts, and clear judgement criteria.
• Guide partners in the transition from manual testing methodologies to automated, data-driven approaches, partnering with internal infrastructure teams to build solutions that accelerate the test-to-reporting feedback loop.
• Spearhead cross-functional collaboration between Waymo and OEM stakeholders, identifying operational gaps, mentoring partner engineers, and building their expertise in complex, cross-system validation.
• Define, execute, and manage early vehicle smoke test campaigns, establishing strict entry/exit criteria to validate SDS-Ready software releases before upstream integration.
• Scale and lead in-territory vehicle-level testing operations, actively managing daily physical test execution alongside embedded vendor teams.
• Ensure strict traceability and logging standards are met across all external test executions to guarantee seamless integration into Waymo’s central data repositories.

Skills

Systems engineering

Test engineering

Autonomous vehicle testing

Leadership

Cross-functional collaboration

Tools

Jama

DOORS

Jira

Python

SQL

Job description

Waymo in Mountain View, California is seeking a Systems Test Engineer Lead to join the Systems Engineering team and help blend software and hardware testing disciplines for autonomous vehicle validation.

This hybrid role reports to the Systems Test Engineering Lead and emphasizes cross-functional collaboration with OEMs, early vehicle testing, and robust traceability to ensure safe, SDS-Ready software releases.