Robotics Software Engineer (Behaviors)

Anduril Industries; Costa Mesa (CA); On-site; USD 146,000 - 194,000; Full time

Job summary

Anduril Industries in Costa Mesa, CA, is seeking a Robotics Software Engineer to develop and maintain code that controls high-level robotic behavior (behavior trees) for multi-asset autonomy. You’ll enable seamless interactions between sensors, flight controllers, and radios while solving problems in networking, autonomy, and systems integration.

You will contribute to testing autonomy code from simulation to real-world flight, collaborate with platform teams, and help turn user needs into

Qualifications

• 3+ years of professional experience programming in Python, C++, or Rust.
• Experience with real-world robotics software stacks and autonomy.
• Ability to work with data processing and complex systems.
• Willingness to travel up to 25% and obtain an active U.S. security clearance.

Responsibilities

• Develop behavior trees and state machines that control high-level robot behavior.
• Write software integrations between autonomy and robotic peripherals.
• Own end-to-end testing from simulation to real-world deployment.
• Collaborate with platform teams to integrate products for end users.
• Create metrics for debugging and monitoring, triage issues, and drive next steps.
• Work with end-users to translate needs into tangible features.

Skills

Python

C++/Rust

Robotics

Data processing

System understanding

Education

CS/Software Eng

Tools

ArduPilot

PX4

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 Team

The Maneuver Dominance team at Anduril develops operationally relevant, multi-asset autonomy. We are focused on making large groups of autonomous systems work effectively together. We leverage existing Anduril drone platforms like Ghost or Altius, in addition to bringing 3rd party platforms into Anduril’s Lattice ecosystem.

About the Job

We are looking for a Robotics Software Engineer to join our rapidly growing team in Costa Mesa, CA. In this role, you will be responsible for developing and maintaining code that controls high-level robotic behavior (behavior trees). Additionally, members of our team contribute to solving a wide variety of problems involving networking, autonomy, systems integration, robotics, and more, while making pragmatic engineering tradeoffs along the way. You will ensure that Anduril products seamlessly work together to achieve a variety of critical outcomes. This will require strong systems-level knowledge and experience. If you are someone who possess a “Whatever It Takes” mindset—executing in an expedient, scalable, and pragmatic way while keeping the mission top‑of‑mind and making sound engineering decisions then this role is for you.

WHAT YOU’LL DO

• Develop behavior trees and state machines that control high-level behavior for teams of robots.
• Write software integrations that enable seamless interactions between autonomy and robotic peripherals e.g. sensors, flight controllers, radios.
• Own end to end testing of autonomy code from simulation to real world flight and customer deployment.
• Collaborate with Anduril software platform teams to integrate and develop their products to serve end users.
• Create and analyze metrics that are leveraged for debugging and monitoring.
• Triage issues, root cause failures, and coordinate next-steps.
• Partner with end-users to turn needs into features while balancing user experience with engineering constraints.
• Travel up to 25% of the time to build, test, and deploy capabilities in the real world.

Core Requirements

• Strong engineering background from industry or school, ideally in areas/fields such as Computer Science, Software Engineering, Mathematics, or Physics.
• 3+ years of professional experience programming in Python, C++ or Rust. You must be proficient in Python for developing autonomy behaviors while possessing basic C++ or Rust skills to integrate these behaviors into real-time systems and interact with hardware efficiently.
• Experience contributing to the stack of real-world robotics applications. e.g. Behaviors, navigation, planning or controls.
• Experience building software solutions involving significant amounts of data processing and analysis.
• Ability to quickly understand and navigate complex systems and established code bases.
• A desire to work on critical software that has a real-world impact.
• Must be willing to travel up to 25%.
• Eligible to obtain an active U.S. Secret security clearance

Preferred Requirements

• Strong background with focus in Physics, Mathematics, and/or Motion Planning to inform modeling & simulation (M&S) and physical systems.
• Developing and testing multi-agent autonomous systems and deploying in real-world environments.
• Feature and algorithm development with an understanding of behavior trees or state machines.
• Experience contributing to, modifying or writing code to interface with open-source autopilot software such as Ardupilot or PX4.
• Developing software/hardware for flight systems and safety critical functionality.
• Experience with distributed communication networks and message standards.

US Salary Range

$146,000—$194,000 USD

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:

Benefits

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. Explore Our Benefits.