Senior Robotics Motion Planning Engineer — Equity Options

Embedding VC; Milpitas (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Stock options/equity

Health, dental, vision insurance

Visa sponsorship and green card

Meals and team events

Job summary

RoboForce in Milpitas, CA is seeking a Senior / Staff Robotics Engineer, Motion Planning to own the local mobility and safety stack for our fleet. You will translate AI-generated routes into feasible trajectories for a heavy base on uneven terrain, while maintaining stability and safety.

You will bridge perception outputs with real-time control, build high-performance C++ pipelines, and collaborate with the WBC team to unify base motion with upper-body manipulation.

Qualifications

• Ph.D. in Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, Computer Science, or related field or MS with 4+ years of experience.
• Deep hands-on experience developing and tuning advanced local planners and trajectory optimization algorithms.
• Strong understanding of kinematics, vehicle dynamics, and center-of-mass constraints for top-heavy mobile robots.

Responsibilities

• Architect and implement advanced local planners and trajectory optimization for mobile robots on uneven terrain.
• Develop and optimize C++ pipelines to consume AI outputs and convert them into constraints for the planner.
• Ensure CoM-aware navigation and stable trajectories on slopes and rough ground.
• Build deterministic safety layer and fallback behaviors overriding AI inputs when safety constraints are violated.
• Design interfaces to pass trajectories and dynamic constraints to Whole-Body Control architecture.

Skills

Motion Planning

Rigid Body Dynamics

C++ Performance Engineering

Field Deployment

Education

Ph.D. in Robotics/Engineering/CS

Tools

C++17/20

Job description

RoboForce in Milpitas, CA is seeking a Senior / Staff Robotics Engineer, Motion Planning to own the local mobility and safety stack for our fleet. You will translate AI-generated routes into feasible trajectories for a heavy base on uneven terrain, while maintaining stability and safety.

You will bridge perception outputs with real-time control, build high-performance C++ pipelines, and collaborate with the WBC team to unify base motion with upper-body manipulation.