Senior Principal Systems Engineer

Cerence Inc.; United States; Hybrid; USD 193,000 - 290,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Salary range $192,500.00 - $290,000.00

Annual bonus opportunity

Insurance coverage (medical, dental,-

Paid time off

Paid holidays

Company contribution to retirement

Equity awards for certain positions

Remote and/or hybrid work available

Job summary

Cerence Inc. is seeking a Senior Principal Systems Engineer for Humanoid Robotics in the California Bay Area.

You will own end-to-end architectures for humanoid robot applications, bridging AI, ROS, and hardware while guiding critical technical decisions and a startup-style engineering team. You will define reusable platforms across robotics, AI, voice, cloud, and edge systems, and lead decisions on frameworks, OS, SDKs, and deployment architectures.

Qualifications

• Robotics Domains: Deep understanding of Navigation & Localization (SLAM, Nav2), Manipulation & Motion Planning (MoveIt2), Perception Pipelines, Sensor Fusion, Robot Middleware, DDS communication, and distributed robotics architectures.
• Systems Engineering: Proven experience designing cyber-physical systems operating under compute limitations, thermal constraints, battery optimization, network intermittency, and fail-safe operational requirements.
• Programming: Advanced C++ (17/20) and Python architectural design expertise.
• Operating Systems: Strong mastery of Linux (Ubuntu/Debian), containerized deployments, and embedded computing platforms.
• Leadership: 3+ years managing engineering teams in startup, R&D, robotics, or fast-paced product development environments.
• Experience: 8+ years in robotics, autonomous systems, industrial automation, physical AI, or complex cyber-physical environments.

Responsibilities

• System Architecture: Design scalable, modular software architectures for humanoid robot applications.
• Tech Stack Selection: Evaluate and select robotic software frameworks, developer SDKs, etc.
• Hardware-Software Co-design: Collaborate closely with mechanical and electrical teams to optimize system latency, compute allocation, thermal envelopes, battery utilization, and power budgets.
• Platform Reuse: Drive a platform strategy enabling modular reuse of application logic across different physical robot forms.
• AI & Agentic Systems: Define how foundation models, agentic orchestration frameworks, memory systems, multimodal AI, and reasoning engines integrate into robot applications.
• Production Readiness: Ensure deployed solutions meet reliability, observability, maintainability, security, and operational requirements.
• Team Supervision: Lead, mentor, and unblock a small, fast-moving startup team of developers.

Skills

Robotics domains

Systems engineering

C++

Python

Linux

Leadership

Startup experience

Education

Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Robotics, Software Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or related discipline

Job description

Senior Principal Systems Engineer – Humanoid Robotics

Location: California Bay Area

Physical AI is transforming how humans interact with intelligent machines. At Cerence, we are extending our leadership in Voice AI and Conversational Intelligence into Humanoid Robotics, building software platforms that enable robots to understand, reason, communicate, and act in the real world.

Role Overview

The Senior Principal Technical Solution Architect owns the end-to-end software architecture for our humanoid robot applications. You will bridge the gap between cutting-edge AI, robotic operating systems, and physical hardware. In this role, you will guide critical technical decisions, manage physical system constraints, and supervise an agile, high-performing startup development team.

Your Impact

Own the end-to-end application architecture for humanoid robots.

Define reusable software platforms spanning robotics, AI, voice, cloud, and edge systems.

Lead technical decisions involving robotics frameworks, operating systems, SDKs, AI infrastructure, and deployment architectures.

Guide proof-of-concepts into production-ready customer deployments.

Collaborate with robotics OEMs, technology partners, and cross-functional engineering teams.

Key Responsibilities

System Architecture: Design scalable, modular software architectures for humanoid robot applications.

Tech Stack Selection: Evaluate and select robotic software frameworks, developer SDKs, etc.

Hardware-Software Co-design: Collaborate closely with mechanical and electrical teams to optimize system latency, compute allocation, thermal envelopes, battery utilization, and power budgets.

Platform Reuse: Drive a platform strategy enabling modular reuse of application logic across different physical robot forms.

AI & Agentic Systems: Define how foundation models, agentic orchestration frameworks, memory systems, multimodal AI, and reasoning engines integrate into robot applications.

Production Readiness: Ensure deployed solutions meet reliability, observability, maintainability, security, and operational requirements.

Team Supervision: Lead, mentor, and unblock a small, fast-moving startup team of developers.

Required Skills & Experience

Mandatory (Must Have)

• Robotics Domains: Deep understanding of Navigation & Localization (SLAM, Nav2), Manipulation & Motion Planning (MoveIt2), Perception Pipelines, Sensor Fusion, Robot Middleware, DDS communication, and distributed robotics architectures.
• Systems Engineering: Proven experience designing cyber-physical systems operating under compute limitations, thermal constraints, battery optimization, network intermittency, and fail-safe operational requirements.
• Programming: Advanced C++ (17/20) and Python architectural design expertise.
• Operating Systems: Strong mastery of Linux (Ubuntu/Debian), containerized deployments, and embedded computing platforms.
• Leadership: 3+ years managing engineering teams in startup, R&D, robotics, or fast-paced product development environments.
• Experience: 8+ years in robotics, autonomous systems, industrial automation, physical AI, or complex cyber-physical environments.

Good to Have (Highly Valued Plus)

• Real-Time Linux: PREEMPT_RT and deterministic kernel environments.
• Microcontroller RTOS: Zephyr RTOS, FreeRTOS or low-level embedded control platforms.
• Developer SDKs & Simulation: NVIDIA Isaac SDK, Isaac Sim, Omniverse, Gazebo, Webots, Intel RealSense.
• Safety & Compliance: ISO 13849, IEC 61508, IEC 62443 and Human-Robot Interaction safety requirements.
• AI & Foundation Models: Experience integrating LLMs, VLMs, agentic workflows, multimodal reasoning and edge AI inference platforms.

Why Join the Team

Help define the future of Voice AI for Physical AI and Humanoid Robotics.

Influence product direction, platform strategy, and customer deployments.

Work across Robotics, Agentic AI, Voice AI, Edge AI, and Cloud Platforms.

Operate with startup agility backed by Cerence technology and brand.

Education & Qualifications

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Robotics, Software Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related discipline.

What we offer

We offer a generous compensation and benefits package (in addition to the base salary), including:

• Salary range $192,500.00 - $290,00.00 USD
• It is not typical for offers to be made at or near the top of the range. The actual salary will be determined based on experience and other job-related factors.
• Annual bonus opportunity
• Insurance coverage (medical, dental, vision, life, and disability)
• Paid time off
• Paid holidays
• Company contribution to the RRSP (Registered Retirement Savings Plan)
• Equity awards for certain positions and levels
• Remote and/or hybrid work available depending on the position
• All compensation and benefits are subject to the terms and conditions of the underlying plans or programs, as applicable, and may be amended, terminated, or replaced from time to time.

About Cerence

Cerence is a global leader in conversational AI and voice technologies. We are expanding our innovations beyond automotive into robotics and physical AI, creating intelligent systems that interact naturally with people across industries and environments.

Equal Opportunity Employer Cerence is committed to providing equal employment opportunities and creating an inclusive environment for all employees.

Cerence Inc. (Nasdaq: CRNC and www.cerence.com) is the global industry leader in creating unique, moving experiences for the automotive world. Spun out from Nuance in October 2019, Cerence is a new, independent company that has quickly gained traction as a leader in the automotive voice assistant space, working with all of the world’s leading automakers – from Ford and Fiat Chrysler to Daimler, Audi and BMW to Geely and SAIC – to transform how a car feels, responds and learns. Its track record is built on more than 20 years of industry experience and leadership and more than 500 million cars on the road today across more than 70 languages. As Cerence looks to the future and continues an ambitious growth agenda, we need someone to join the team and help build the future of voice and AI in cars. This is an exciting opportunity to join Cerence’s passionate, dedicated, global team and be a part of meaningful innovation in a rapidly growing industry.

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER

Cerence is firmly committed to Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) and to compliance with all federal, state and local laws that prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of age, race, color, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sex, sex stereotyping, pregnancy, national origin, ancestry, religion, physical or mental disability, medical condition, marital status, citizenship status, sexual orientation, protected military or veteran status, genetic information and other protected classifications. Cerence Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.

All prospective and current Employees need to remain vigilant when it comes to executing security policies in the workplace. This includes:

• Following workplace security protocols and training programs to familiarize with the ways to maintain a safe workplace.
• Following security procedures to report any suspicious activity.
• Having respect for corporate security procedures to allow those procedures to be effective.
• Adhering to company's compliance and regulations.
• Encouraging to follow a zero tolerance for workplace violence.
• Basic knowledge of information security and data privacy requirements (e.g., how to protect data & how to be handling this data).
• Demonstrative knowledge of information security through internal training programs.

At Cerence AI, we help the world's leading automotive and technology brands leverage AI to create safer, more productive and more joy-filled brand and user experiences. We're looking for motivated, collaborative individuals who come alive with big challenges and are excited about AI's potential to shape the future of how people experience the world.