Principal Engineer, 3D Reconstruction

Icehouseventures; Sunnyvale (CA); Hybrid; USD 230,000 - 320,000; Full time

Job summary

Wayve in Sunnyvale seeks a Principal Engineer for 3D reconstruction to lead offline 3D world geometry extraction from vehicle sensor data in dynamic scenes, aligning localization, mapping, state estimation and sensor fusion. This hybrid, full-time role focuses on building trusted reconstructions for validation, data enrichment, and model development.

You will set the technical direction, prototype early solutions, and coordinate across calibration, perception, data, and validation teams while

Qualifications

• Deep technical expertise in SLAM, 3D reconstruction, mapping, state estimation, or related robotics/perception fields.
• Hands-on experience with lidar-based reconstruction, point-cloud registration, pose estimation, and real-world robotics sensor data.
• Experience building offline reconstruction, mapping, or perception systems that handle large sensor data.
• Strong software engineering skills in C++, Python, or similar robotics/perception environments.
• Experience taking research or prototype algorithms into reliable production systems.
• Comfortable defining technical strategy, roadmaps, and milestones in ambiguous problem spaces
• Strong cross-functional technical leadership in ambiguous, multi-team environments.
• Clear communication of algorithmic tradeoffs, limitations, and failure modes to technical and cross functional stakeholders.
• Systems-level understanding of sensor calibration, timing, synchronization and quality issues, and ability to define requirements and work with specialist teams to achieve them

Responsibilities

• Define the technical architecture and roadmap for Wayve’s offline 3D reconstruction system.
• Lead the development of MVPs that unblock high-priority internal use cases, while guiding the transition to a robust internal platform.
• Establish the core technical interfaces, output representations, and tools needed to support internal customers.
• Partner with calibration, sensor fusion, perception, data, infrastructure, and validation teams to align requirements, resources and ownership boundaries.
• Set technical standards for reconstruction quality, failure analysis, uncertainty measurement, and dataset suitability and execute strategies to validate them
• Mentor and provide technical leadership to engineers contributing to the 3D reconstruction effort.
• Communicate technical tradeoffs, limitations, and progress clearly to engineering leaders and cross-functional stakeholders.

Skills

SLAM & 3D reconstruction

Pose estimation

Offline reconstruction systems

C++ / Python

Cross-functional leadership

Technical strategy & roadmaps

Communication

Robotics perception

Education

MS/PhD in Robotics, CS, State Estimation, Sensor Fusion, SLAM, 3D Reconstruction

Tools

ROS

PCL

OpenCV

CUDA

Job description

About us

Founded in 2017, Wayve is the leading developer of Embodied AI technology. Our advanced AI software and foundation models enable vehicles to perceive, understand, and navigate any complex environment, enhancing the usability and safety of automated driving systems.

Our vision is to create autonomy that propels the world forward. Our intelligent, mapless, and hardware-agnostic AI products are designed for automakers, accelerating the transition from assisted to automated driving.
In our fast-paced environment big problems ignite us—we embrace uncertainty, leaning into complex challenges to unlock groundbreaking solutions. We aim high and stay humble in our pursuit of excellence, constantly learning and evolving as we pave the way for a smarter, safer future.

At Wayve, your contributions matter. We value diversity, embrace new perspectives, and foster an inclusive work environment; we back each other to deliver impact.

Make Wayve the experience that defines your career!

The Role

Wayve is looking for a Principal Engineer, 3D Reconstruction to lead the development of an offline 3D reconstruction capability that builds high-quality 3D world geometry from vehicle sensor data in dynamic scenes. The system will draw on localization and mapping, state estimation, and sensor fusion to produce offline 3D geometric reconstructions and best-estimate ego motion from heterogeneous vehicle platforms and sensor suites. The work will support internal validation, data enrichment, and model development by turning raw sensor data into reliable, quality-assessed 3D ground-truth outputs. This is a principal-level technical leadership role for someone who can set the technical direction, build early prototypes, and align cross-functional teams around a shared reconstruction capability.

Key Responsibilities

• Define the technical architecture and roadmap for Wayve’s offline 3D reconstruction system.
• Lead the development of MVPs that unblock high-priority internal use cases, while guiding the transition to a robust internal platform.
• Establish the core technical interfaces, output representations, and tools needed to support internal customers.
• Partner with calibration, sensor fusion, perception, data, infrastructure, and validation teams to align requirements, resources and ownership boundaries.
• Set technical standards for reconstruction quality, failure analysis, uncertainty measurement, and dataset suitability and execute strategies to validate them
• Mentor and provide technical leadership to engineers contributing to the 3D reconstruction effort.
• Communicate technical tradeoffs, limitations, and progress clearly to engineering leaders and cross-functional stakeholders.

Required Skills/Experience

• Deep technical expertise in SLAM, 3D reconstruction, mapping, state estimation, or closely related robotics/perception fields.
• Strong hands‑on experience with lidar‑based reconstruction, point‑cloud registration, pose estimation, and real‑world robotics sensor data.
• Experience building offline reconstruction, mapping, or perception systems that operate on large volumes of sensor data.
• Strong software engineering skills in C++, Python, or similar robotics/perception environments.
• Experience taking research or prototype algorithms into reliable production systems.
• Comfortable defining technical strategy, roadmaps, and milestones in ambiguous problem spaces
• Strong cross‑functional technical leadership in ambiguous, multi‑team environments.
• Clear communication of algorithmic tradeoffs, limitations, confidence, and failure modes to technical and cross functional stakeholders.
• Systems‑level understanding of sensor calibration, timing, synchronization and quality issues, and ability to define requirements and work with specialist teams to achieve them

Desired Skills/Experience

• MS/PhD in Robotics, Computer Science, State Estimation, Sensor Fusion, SLAM, 3D Reconstruction, or a related technical field; or equivalent practical experience.
• Experience with autonomous vehicles, robotics, mapping, or ground‑truth data pipelines in a production setting.
• Experience with GNSS/INS fusion, sensor based odometry, or other high‑accuracy position estimation approaches
• Experience with nonlinear optimization techniques such as pose graph optimization, factor graphs, bundle adjustment, ICP etc
• Experience apply modern machine learning approaches to 3D reconstruction, mapping, or scene understanding, including foundation models or learned 3D representations
• Familiarity with robotics tooling such as ROS, PCL, OpenCV, CUDA, or similar.
• Familiarity with ML data enrichment, autolabelling, annotation workflows, or validation‑data generation.
• Experience designing quality metrics, validation evidence, or credibility arguments for reconstructed data.
• Experience leading small expert technical teams from early‑stage concept to production use.

This role is a full‑time role based in Sunnyvale.

At Wayve we want the best of all worlds so we operate a hybrid working policy that combines time together in our offices and workshops to fuel innovation, culture, relationships and learning, and time spent working from home. We operate core working hours so you can determine the schedule that works best for you and your team.

Wayve is committed to creating an inclusive interview experience. If you require any accommodations or adjustments to participate fully in our interview process, please let us know.

At Wayve we're committed to creating a diverse, fair and respectful culture that is inclusive of everyone based on their unique skills and perspectives, and regardless of sex, race, religion or belief, ethnic or national origin, disability, age, citizenship, marital, domestic or civil partnership status, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, pregnancy or related condition (including breastfeeding) or any other basis as protected by applicable law.

For more information visit Careers at Wayve.

To learn more about what drives us, visit Values at Wayve

For US candidates only, please visit E-Verify Notice and Participation and Right to Work

DISCLAIMER: We will not ask about marriage or pregnancy, care responsibilities or disabilities in any of our job adverts or interviews. However, we do look to capture information about care responsibilities, and disabilities among other diversity information as part of an optional DEI Monitoring form to help us identify areas of improvement in our hiring process and ensure that the process is inclusive and non‑discriminatory.