Senior GNC Engineer

Neros Technologies; Torrance (CA); On-site; USD 164,000 - 229,000; Full time

Job summary

Neros Technologies is seeking a GNC Engineer to own terminal guidance and the control path for our unmanned aircraft. You will shape the guidance law, aimpoint command, and stable interfaces to flight control, ensuring engagement accuracy against maneuvering targets in realistic conditions.

You should bring 5+ years delivering guidance/control software on real vehicles, strong C++ and Python skills, and deep knowledge of Kalman filtering, state estimation, and flight dynamics.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional experience developing guidance, navigation, and control software for missiles, interceptors, unmanned aircraft, or autonomous vehicles.
• Expert-level knowledge of terminal homing guidance and related concepts.
• Demonstrated delivery of guidance/control software onto a physical air vehicle.
• Proficient in C++ and Python, including embedded/real-time development.
• Experience with state estimation and sensor fusion techniques including Kalman filtering.
• Experience with flight dynamics, autopilot interfaces, and control authority limits.
• Ability to analyze flight/test data to reconstruct onboard decisions and root causes.
• Familiarity with coordinate frames, time synchronization, and uncertainty representation.

Responsibilities

• Own terminal guidance and control path for Neros unmanned aircraft, covering guidance law and interface to flight control.
• Ensure engagement accuracy against maneuvering targets under realistic conditions.
• Collaborate on flight/test planning, instrumentation, and data review to improve performance.

Skills

Guidance and control

Terminal guidance

Flight test experience

C++ programming

Python programming

State estimation

Sensor fusion

Autonomous vehicles

Log analysis

Coordinate frames

Tools

Kalman filtering

Embedded/RTOS

Job description

Neros is a defense technology company rebuilding America’s drone industrial base. We design and manufacture high-performance unmanned systems that are tested in combat, iterated at startup speed, and built at massive scale. Our team culture is fast, hands-on, and obsessed with closing the gap between design and deployment.

As drones transform the character of warfare, Neros is delivering the systems the West needs to compete on the modern battlefield and deter the adversaries of democracy. We’re hiring engineers, operators, and builders who want to move fast, take on extreme ownership, and get capability into the hands of warfighters in months, not years.

What you will be doing

The GNC Engineer owns terminal guidance and the associated control path across Neros unmanned aircraft, covering the guidance law, aimpoint command, achievable-acceleration management, and the interface to flight control. This role is accountable for engagement accuracy against maneuvering targets under realistic conditions, including imperfect target state estimates, degraded or lost sensor track, and limited control authority late in the engagement.

You should have the following

• 5+ years of professional experience developing guidance, navigation, and control software for missiles, interceptors, guided munitions, unmanned aircraft, or comparable autonomous vehicles, with demonstrated ownership of a guidance or control function through flight
• Expert-level knowledge of terminal homing guidance, including proportional and augmented proportional navigation, zero-effort-miss formulations, time-to-go estimation, lead-pursuit geometry, and miss-distance analysis against maneuvering targets
• Demonstrated delivery of guidance or control software onto a physical air vehicle that has flown, not just in simulation
• Production proficiency in C++ and Python, including embedded or real-time development under deterministic execution and latency constraints on resource-limited flight computers
• Working depth in state estimation and sensor fusion, including Kalman and extended Kalman filtering, target motion models, covariance propagation, and observability analysis
• Experience with flight dynamics and control, including autopilot and inner-loop interfaces. Including control authority and actuator saturation limits, achievable-acceleration envelopes, and position or velocity hold control
• Demonstrated use of flight or field test data for closed-loop analysis, including log-based replay, reconstruction of onboard decisions, and root-cause investigation of anomalous engagements
• Fluency with coordinate frame conventions, time synchronization, sensor latency accounting, and uncertainty representation across software interfaces
• Experience participating directly in flight or field test operations, including test planning, instrumentation requirements, range operations, and post-test data review

Nice to have

• Experience with terminal guidance against surface or ground targets, including aimpoint selection on an extended target, impact-angle or impact-point shaping, and engagement geometry planning
• Experience developing safety-critical or high-consequence decision logic, such as engagement authorization, abort criteria, or failsafe behavior, together with the supporting test evidence and written rationale
• Experience with deterministic, reproducible software design for flight-critical components, including bit-exact replay from logged data.
• Background in autonomous vehicles, robotics, or another domain with mature closed-loop evaluation practice, including regression suites, scenario libraries, and release gating on measured performance

US Salary Range

$163,500 – $228,500 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 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 considered part of Neros' total compensation package.

We’re an equal opportunity employer. We welcome all applicants without attention to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran or disability status.

Export Compliance: The person hired will have access to information and items controlled by the International Traffic in Arms Regulation (ITAR), and, therefore, must be a \"U.S. Person\" or otherwise eligible to receive an export license. As defined in the ITAR, a “U.S. Person” includes U.S. citizens, noncitizen U.S. nationals, lawful permanent residents (i.e., Green Card holders), and certain other classes of individuals (e.g., asylees/refugees). Please consult with a knowledgeable advisor if you are unsure whether you are a “U.S. Person.” To assist Neros in assessing its export compliance obligations in relation to your application, please identify which statement best applies to you: * Select...

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For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self-identification survey.Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiringprocess or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in aconfidential file.

As set forth in Neros Technologies’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy,we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

If you believe you belong to any of the categories of protected veterans listed below, please indicate by making the appropriate selection.As a government contractor subject to the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA), we request this information in order to measurethe effectiveness of the outreach and positive recruitment efforts we undertake pursuant to VEVRAA. Classification of protected categoriesis as follows:

A \"disabled veteran\" is one of the following: a veteran of the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service who is entitled to compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs; or a person who was discharged or released from active duty because of a service-connected disability.

A \"recently separated veteran\" means any veteran during the three-year period beginning on the date of such veteran's discharge or release from active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval, or air service.

An \"active duty wartime or campaign badge veteran\" means a veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized under the laws administered by the Department of Defense.

An \"Armed forces service medal veteran\" means a veteran who, while serving on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces service medal was awarded pursuant to Executive Order 12985.