Perception Systems Engineer

Anduril Industries; Costa Mesa (CA); On-site; USD 146,000 - 220,000; Full time

Job summary

Anduril Industries in California seeks a Systems Engineer to lead perception system development for the Maneuver Dominance team. You will own the sensing suite baseline across aircraft variants, define what to detect, ranges, and environmental conditions, and ensure test evidence supports readiness.

You will collaborate with internal and partner engineers, set technical objectives for sensing, and represent Anduril as a technical authority in industry forums.

Qualifications

• BS or MS in Electrical Engineering, Optics, Physics, CS, Robotics, Aerospace, or equivalent.

Responsibilities

• Drive perception system architecture and allocate requirements across sensing, compute, and algorithms.
• Own the sensor suite baseline across platforms and variants.
• Set and defend the sensing performance model against test results.
• Lead verification, test objectives, and evidence packages for flight readiness.
• Provide technical authority at gate reviews and defend decisions.
• Lead sensor trades and document decisions for program continuity.
• Drive modularity and open mission system alignment across platforms.
• Set engineering practices for sensing, modeling, and proof.
• Own perception in flight tests and feed results back into requirements.
• Represent Anduril externally as a technical authority on airborne sensing.

Skills

Electrical engineering background

Optics knowledge

Sensor systems experience

System architecture ownership

Test & flight experience

Security clearance (US TS)

Education

BS or MS in Electrical Engineering/Optics/CS

Tools

Jama requirements tools

Radiometry & detector tools

MTF/NETD analysis tools

Job description

Anduril Industries is a defense technology company with a mission to transform U.S. and allied military capabilities with advanced technology. By bringing the expertise, technology, and business model of the 21st century’s most innovative companies to the defense industry, Anduril is changing how military systems are designed, built and sold. Anduril’s family of systems is powered by Lattice OS, an AI-powered operating system that turns thousands of data streams into a realtime, 3D command and control center. As the world enters an era of strategic competition, Anduril is committed to bringing cutting-edge autonomy, AI, computer vision, sensor fusion, and networking technology to the military in months, not years.

About The Job

Anduril is seeking a Systems Engineer to support perception system development for the Maneuver Dominance, Enabling Technology team. The Maneuver Dominance (MD) Team at Anduril develops aerial robotic systems designed to operate in large coordinated teams in concert with ground maneuver forces.

Perception is what allows an autonomous aircraft to understand the world immediately around it and act on what it finds there. Delivering that is a sensing problem first. The system spans multiple sensor modalities, the apertures and fields of regard those sensors are installed into, the compute that runs them, and the calibration and timing that turn several sensors into one coherent picture of the world. It is developed once, in ET, and inherited by every MD program that needs it.

You will be a key technical leader for that system, and the center of gravity of the role is the sensing suite itself: which sensors are in the baseline and why, what the system is required to detect, at what range, and in what conditions, how that is proven, and what evidence a receiving program gets when the capability transitions onto their aircraft. You will lead this across several concurrent efforts, including in-house sensor development with partner engineering teams elsewhere in Anduril, and new sensing work as the portfolio grows. You will work with Perception Engineering leadership to set the technical objectives for the sensing suite, and own what correct means and how it is demonstrated.

This is a role with depth at its center and reach at its edges. We are hiring for someone who has demonstrated experience making sensing systems work on real vehicles, and whose judgment about where sensing is going carries weight well beyond this team.

What You’ll Do

• Drive the perception system architecture and requirements baseline: decompose mission need into detection, range, field of regard, latency, and availability requirements, allocate them across sensing, compute, and algorithms, and keep them traceable through to test evidence
• Own the sensor suite baseline and its configuration across platforms, including which modalities and part numbers are in the baseline for each aircraft variant, where they are installed, and the interfaces to the programs and airframes that carry them
• Set and defend the sensing performance model: detection probability and false alarm rate against target size, reflectivity, range, aspect, illumination, and weather, built up from radiometry and detector performance, and reconciled against measured flight test results
• Drive the verification and validation strategy for perception: verification plans, bench and hardware in the loop coverage, sensor characterization test, flight test objectives, data collection needs, and the evidence package that demonstrates a capability is ready to graduate onto a program aircraft
• Provide the technical authority at design and gate reviews, judging whether perception evidence is sufficient and coverage is complete, and holding the line when it is not
• Lead sensor trades that resolve real forks, framing the decision, defining the criteria, running the analysis, and documenting the result so it survives the people who made it
• Drive modularity and reuse so that perception ports across platforms, including sensor abstraction, interface stability under sensor substitution, and open mission system alignment
• Set the sensing engineering practice that others inherit: how we model performance, how we characterize a sensor, and what constitutes proof, so that each new effort starts from an established method rather than reinventing one
• Own perception in the air: instrument flight tests, be at the aircraft for them, and drive the analysis loop from collected data back into requirements and architecture
• Represent Anduril externally as a technical authority on airborne sensing, including standards and industry bodies, sensor vendors and development partners, and technical engagement with customers

Required Qualifications

• B.S. or M.S. in Electrical Engineering, Optics, Physics, Computer Science, Robotics, Aerospace, or a similar field, or equivalent experience
• 5+ years of engineering experience on electro-optical, LiDAR, RADAR, or comparable sensing systems, including time as the technical owner of a sensing system through to fielded or flight demonstrated performance
• Demonstrated depth in multi-modal sensor architecture and sensor selection, with a working command of the detection physics that bounds each one
• Demonstrated experience owning system architecture and interface definition for a sensing system, including the interfaces to compute, to autonomy consumers, and to the vehicle
• Ability to exercise extremely high ownership over a complex system across design, integration, test, and flight test
• Demonstrated experience specifying and verifying sensing performance quantitatively, including detection and false alarm characterization, range performance analysis, and validation of a model against measured data
• Working command of electro-optical, LiDAR, and/or RADAR system engineering fundamentals: radiometry and link budgets, detector and optics selection, noise and sensitivity metrics such as NETD and NEP, resolution and MTF, and atmospheric transmission and its effect on range
• Demonstrated experience with the systems engineering rigor this role sits on: requirements management, traceability to verification, ICDs, and technical performance measures as a managed baseline
• Outstanding written and verbal communication, including presenting and defending technical positions to program leadership, to engineering peers who disagree, and to audiences outside the company such as standards bodies, development partners, and customers
• Must be eligible to obtain and maintain a US Top Secret security clearance

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with learned perception in a safety relevant system, including evaluation gates, dataset and labeling strategy, and the argument for why a model's measured performance is trustworthy
• Experience with embedded compute and SWaP-C budgeting for airborne perception, including latency budgets end to end from photon to autonomy input
• Experience with environmental qualification of airborne sensors, for example MIL-STD-810 and MIL-STD-461, and with airworthiness or certification evidence for aircraft
• Experience transitioning a capability out of development and into a delivery program or product line, including the evidence handoff
• Experience as a technical lead or principal investigator, in a matrixed or IRAD funded environment
• Experience with requirements management tooling such as Jama, including traceability from requirement through to verification evidence
• Participation in a standards or industry body relevant to airborne sensing or airspace integration, for example RTCA or SAE committee work

US Salary Range

$146,000—$220,000 USD

Benefits

The salary range for this role is an estimate based on a wide range of compensation factors, inclusive of base salary only. Actual salary offer may vary based on (but not limited to) work experience, education and/or training, critical skills, and/or business considerations. Highly competitive equity grants are included in the majority of full time offers; and are considered part of Anduril's total compensation package. Additionally, Anduril offers top-tier benefits for full-time employees, including: At Anduril, we invest in our people. Our comprehensive, competitive benefits package (available at little to no cost to employees) ensures you’re supported in health, recovery, and whatever comes next.

Data Privacy

To view Anduril's candidate data privacy policy, please visit https://anduril.com/applicant-privacy-notice/.

By submitting your application, you consent to Anduril Industries using a third-party service provider to conduct pre-employment risk, integrity, and due diligence screening and assessing potential risks as part of your application process. This third-party service provider provides risk‑intelligence services that may include analysis of sanctions and watchlists, adverse media, public‑record information, and other lawful open‑source or commercial data sources. This third-party service provider does not act as a consumer reporting agency. Use of this provider helps to ensure compliance with applicable laws and protect technology, intellectual property, and organizational security.