Senior Edge Engineer

queueinc

Newark (CA)

Hybrid

USD 140,000 - 190,000

Full time

3 days ago

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Job summary

Queue Inc. in the Bay Area seeks a senior edge software engineer to own critical parts of the embedded system that runs our prescription-dispensing machine.

You will work with Rust, C, or C++ on Linux, shaping hardware links, fill sequencing, and contracts with microcontrollers and the vision service. You will join the Edge squad, ensuring safe stop behavior if a step cannot be confirmed, and collaborating with firmware, platform, and reliability engineers to ship updates to field machines.

Qualifications

Proficient in production C, C++ or Rust on Linux and ownership of shipped components.
Experience integrating hardware buses (CAN, RS-485, USB) and debugging with analyzers.
Expertise in real-time orchestration and state machine design.
Understanding MCU boundaries and versioned device protocols with firmware.
Strong embedded Linux experience including services, startup and updates.

Responsibilities

Own hardware links between edge software and motor boards, framing, timing and tests.
Design fill sequencing state machines and their testing strategies.
Define contracts at MCU and vision service boundaries and manage versions.
Specify software requirements from the Linux image and collaborate on image updates.
Address field behavior, diagnostics, and safe rollback during updates.
Ensure fail-closed behavior and traceability from design to bench validation.

Skills

C/C++/Rust on Linux

Hardware bus integration

Real-time state machines

MCU boundary literacy

Embedded Linux

Fleet updates/telemetry

Tools

CAN bus debugging

RS-485 debugging

USB/Ethernet debugging

Device firmware interfaces

Job description

About Us

Queue builds robots to fill prescriptions. Our machine is designed to take stock bottles of medication and produce counted, labeled vials, so that pharmacists and technicians can spend their time on patients. Our first product is built to work behind the pharmacy counter and to be operated by pharmacy staff.

About the Role

We are building out the Edge squad: the engineers who write the software that runs on our machine and tells its hardware what to do. You own hard parts of that software end to end, from the links to the boards to the way a new version reaches a machine in the field and behaves there. On every path you own you build to one rule: when the machine cannot confirm a step, it stops safely and says why.

This is a senior-level role.

What You'll Own

Hardware links — The edge software's side of the links to the motor board and the other controllers, over CAN, serial, USB and Ethernet: framing, timing, errors, reconnects and the tests that prove them. You set how they are built and tested.
Fill sequencing — The state machines that take a fill from the moment it reaches the machine to the moment the machine finishes or stops. You set how they are designed and tested.
Contracts at the boundaries — The contracts with the microcontrollers and the vision service. You version them and change them with the firmware and vision engineers, so that old and new versions work together through a release.
What the software needs from the image — The services, devices, bus settings and packages the edge software needs from the machine's Linux image. You make those changes with the engineers who own the image.
Field behavior — What the edge software reports from a machine in the field, how it is diagnosed from a distance, and its part in how a new version arrives and how it is rolled back if it fails. You build it with the platform and systems reliability engineers.
Fail-closed behavior — The rule on every path you own: when the machine cannot confirm a step, it stops safely and says why. You design the failure path first and prove it on the bench.

First 90 Days

Day 30: You have built the edge software, run it against the boards on a bench, and merged changes through review. You can trace a fill through the state machines and name each point where it has to stop if a step cannot be confirmed.
Day 60: You own a hardware link and its contract end to end. You have made a change to the machine's Linux image with the engineers who own it, and run it on a bench machine.
Day 90: You have taken a change from design through a release to a machine on the bench, with its failure paths tested first. You hold a written plan for what the edge software reports from the field and how it is diagnosed from a distance.

What We're Looking For

Must-Have

Ownership — you have written production C, C++ or Rust on Linux and owned what you shipped, from the first design to the fault found in the field.
Hardware integration over buses — CAN, RS-485 and other serial links, USB. You have debugged a link with an analyzer on the wire when the logs and the hardware disagreed.
Real-time orchestration and state machines — you have sequenced motion, sensing and I/O where partial failure is normal, and you design the failure path first: when a step cannot be confirmed, the system stops safely and says why.
MCU boundary literacy — you understand how a microcontroller runs and what it exposes to a Linux host, and you have kept versioned device protocols with firmware working through change, for example a protobuf schema, a CAN message set or a register map.
Embedded Linux integration — you have done substantial work getting software running well on an embedded Linux system: its services, devices, start-up, configuration and updates, worked out with the owners of its image.
Connected device fleets — you have run devices in the field: updates, remote diagnostics, telemetry, and the recovery of a unit you cannot touch.

The edge software is written in Rust, and you will work in it every day. Rust in production is preferred.

Nice-to-Have

Industrial x86 and ARM platforms in a shipped product.
Full ownership of an embedded Linux distribution: building and maintaining the image of a shipped device, from what goes into it to how it updates.
Kernel and board bring-up: drivers, device trees and boot on a new board.
Hardened device platforms: verified start-up, signed updates, a read-only system and device identity.
NVIDIA Jetson: JetPack and Linux for Tegra, secure boot, field updates and the inference stack.
Robotics, medical devices, automotive or industrial automation.

How We Hire

Recruiter Screen (30 min)
Technical Interview (90 min) — a take-home exercise of 2 to 3 hours, in C, C++ or Rust, sent at least 24 hours before: a small piece of device software built around a state machine, which has to stay correct when power is lost at any step. We go through it together, then build on it.
Design Interview (60 min) — the path a new version of the software takes to a fleet of machines, with the failure cases in from the start.
Leadership Interview (60 min) — how you own your work and work across squads.

Two interviewers score each technical stage independently.

What We Offer

Ownership — hard parts of the edge software end to end, from the links to the boards to machines in the field
Hard problems: real-time sequencing across boards, contracts with firmware and vision, and machines in the field you cannot touch
Small team, zero bureaucracy, high trust

Why Join Us Now?

Impact & Growth

Direct Impact: The code you write tells the machine's hardware what to do, on the bench and in the field
Growth: The work runs from one hardware link to how the software behaves on every machine in the field

Team and Culture

Reports to the Head of Software Engineering with significant autonomy and influence
Who You Work With: You work every day with the engineers who build the edge software, and closely with the firmware, vision, platform and systems reliability engineers
Where We Work: Hybrid, three days a week at our headquarters in the Bay Area; the bench work needs the hardware in front of you

Our Values