Senior Software Engineer

Red Cat Holdings; Torrance (CA); On-site; USD 132,000 - 183,000; Full time

Job summary

FlightWave Aerospace is seeking a Senior Software Engineer to develop embedded software for autonomous aircraft and UAS. You will own production C/C++ software across microcontrollers and Linux-based processors, integrating sensors, and supporting ground and flight tests.

The role requires strong experience in real-time systems, kernel debugging, and cross-domain collaboration with hardware, autonomy, and flight-operations teams.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in a related field or equivalent practical experience.
• Seven+ years of professional software development with embedded aircraft/VTOL/UAS experience.
• Advanced embedded C and modern C++ proficiency including memory behavior and concurrency.
• Production experience for microcontrollers and application processors (ARM Cortex-M/A).
• Experience with RTOS and embedded Linux, including scheduling, IPC, and debugging.
• Experience with DroneCAN/CAN, Ethernet, SPI, I2C, UART, MavLink and related protocols.
• Experience integrating sensors on resource-constrained platforms with timing and data integrity considerations.
• Experience taking software from design through bring-up, bench testing, and flight testing.
• Ability to create testable interfaces, automated tests, logs, and measurable performance criteria.
• Ability to explain decisions, lead reviews, and mentor engineers.

Responsibilities

• Design, implement, review, and maintain embedded C/C++ software for microcontrollers and edge platforms.
• Own features from requirements through test and flight-test support.
• Develop board-support, device interfaces, middleware, and application software for RTOS and embedded Linux.
• Integrate sensors and perception data with reliable data paths and time synchronization.
• Develop perception capabilities including detection, tracking, and fusion.
• Optimize performance and power while preserving deterministic behavior.
• Define secure interfaces among subsystems including perception and flight controls.
• Diagnose cross-domain issues with debuggers and logs.
• Build and maintain unit, integration, and hardware-in-the-loop tests.
• Analyze flight data and drive defects to root cause.
• Contribute to design reviews, coding standards, and risk analysis.
• Provide technical leadership and mentorship.
• Deliver maintainable production software on target hardware.
• Support prototype and production integration and test events.

Skills

Embedded C/C++

RTOS experience

Embedded Linux

Sensor integration

Vehicle software development

Education

Bachelor's degree

Tools

Yocto/OpenEmbedded

Docker

Git

MavLink/CAN

Job description

Position Summary

FlightWave Aerospace is seeking a Senior Software Engineer to develop embedded software for autonomous aircraft and uncrewed aerial systems. This engineer will own production C and C++ software across microcontrollers and Linux-based application processors, integrate sensors and perception capabilities, and support systems from architecture and hardware bring-up through ground and flight test. The ideal candidate brings recent VTOL, UAS, or other vehicle embedded-software experience; deep expertise in real-time and embedded Linux systems; and the judgment to diagnose issues spanning software, electronics, sensors, networks, and vehicle behavior. The role partners with electrical, systems, controls, autonomy, test, manufacturing, and flight-operations teams.

Essential Duties And Responsibilities

Essential functions of a job that are crucial to its purpose and must be performed regularly. They are the fundamental tasks that an employee must be able to carry out, with or without reasonable accommodation, and are central to defining the role’s purpose.

• Design, implement, review, and maintain embedded C and C++ software for microcontrollers, application processors, and heterogeneous aircraft edge-compute platforms.
• Own features from requirements and architecture through implementation, integration, verification, release, and ground or flight-test support.
• Develop board-support, device-interface, middleware, and application-layer software for real-time operating systems and embedded Linux.
• Integrate cameras, EO/IR payloads, IMUs, GNSS, radar, lidar, and other sensors with reliable data paths, time synchronization, health monitoring, and fault handling.
• Develop or integrate perception capabilities including detection, tracking, localization, visual odometry, mapping, calibration, and multi-sensor fusion as programs require.
• Optimize CPU, GPU, memory, I/O, startup, latency, throughput, and power while preserving deterministic behavior on critical paths.
• Define secure, stable interfaces among perception, autonomy, flight controls, vehicle management, communications, payloads, and operator applications.
• Diagnose cross-domain problems with target debuggers, traces, logic analyzers, telemetry, recorded sensor data, core dumps, and system logs.
• Build and maintain unit, integration, software-in-the-loop, hardware-in-the-loop, regression, and performance tests.
• Analyze ground and flight data, drive defects to root cause, and establish measurable timing, memory, reliability, and functional acceptance criteria.
• Contribute to requirements traceability, design reviews, coding standards, configuration management, risk analysis, and program assurance evidence.
• Provide technical leadership through architecture decisions, code reviews, mentorship, planning, and multidisciplinary coordination.
• Deliver maintainable production software on target hardware with actionable logs, testable interfaces, and automated regression coverage.
• Support prototype and production integration, scheduled test events, and other duties aligned with the role as assigned.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, Aerospace Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Seven or more years of professional software development, including recent hands-on embedded development of aircraft, VTOL/UAS, autonomous vehicles, embedded systems, robotics, or comparable vehicle platforms.
• Advanced embedded C and modern C++ proficiency, including object lifetime, ownership, concurrency, integer behavior, memory layout, performance, and undefined-behavior avoidance.
• Production experience developing for both microcontrollers and application processors, such as ARM Cortex-M and Cortex-A class devices or comparable architectures.
• Experience with an RTOS and embedded Linux, including scheduling, multithreading, IPC, boot flow, device interfaces, and system-level debugging.
• Experience with vehicle and board interfaces such as DroneCAN/CAN/CAN FD, Ethernet, SPI, I2C, UART, MavLINK, BDShot, and GPIO, plus related transport or messaging protocols.
• Experience integrating sensors or perception data on resource-constrained platforms, accounting for calibration, timing, dropped data, vibration, lighting, latency, and environmental failure modes.
• Experience taking software from design and hardware bring-up through bench testing, vehicle integration, and field or flight testing.
• Ability to create testable interfaces, automated tests, actionable logs, and measurable performance and reliability criteria.
• Ability to explain technical decisions, lead reviews, mentor engineers, and collaborate effectively with multidisciplinary teams.

Additional Desired Qualifications

• Direct VTOL, UAS, autopilot, flight-computer, or flight-control ecosystem experience, including PX4 or an equivalent platform.
• Aerial-vehicle perception experience in sensor fusion, visual-inertial odometry, SLAM, GNSS-denied navigation, object detection, tracking, or terrain-relative localization.
• Embedded computer-vision or machine-learning optimization using OpenCV, Eigen, CUDA, TensorRT, ONNX Runtime, or comparable technologies.
• Hands-on NXP, Qualcomm, or NVIDIA processor development, including board-support packages, acceleration frameworks, profiling tools, and development kits.
• Yocto Project, OpenEmbedded, Buildroot, custom Linux distributions, bootloaders, kernel configuration, or device-driver experience.
• Qt and QML development for operator-facing or engineering applications.
• Docker-based development or deployment workflows and cross-compilation for target hardware.
• Conan for C/C++ dependency management and JFrog Artifactory for binary artifacts.
• Python and GitLab CI/CD or comparable automated tooling for test, data analysis, builds, packaging, static analysis, and release.
• Familiarity with DO-178C, ARP4754A, DO-254 interfaces, MISRA C/C++, requirements-based testing, structural coverage, or similar safety-related methods.
• Secure boot, signed updates, trusted execution, platform hardening, or connected embedded-system cybersecurity experience.
• Agentic development tools or workflows for coding, testing, documentation, or log analysis, with security, traceability, review, and human accountability.

Physical Requirements and Working Conditions

• Work with prototype and production hardware in laboratory, engineering, manufacturing, and flight-test environments.
• Travel to integration and flight-test sites as program schedules require; expected travel is 10% or less.
• Participate in scheduled test events or issue-response activities outside standard hours when necessary; specific expectations are defined before hire.
• Comply with applicable safety, security, export-control, information-handling, and facility-access procedures.

Background Check

This position will require successfully completing a post-offer background check. Qualified candidates with a criminal history will be considered and are not automatically disqualified, consistent with federal and state law.

EEO and ITAR/EAR Work Authorization Disclosure

Red Cat Holdings provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identification or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This position requires direct or indirect access to hardware software, technology or technical data controlled under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and the Export Administration Regulations (EAR). Successful candidates for positions subject to ITAR/EAR restrictions must provide proof of U.S. Citizenship or Permanent Residence and must not require sponsorship for export-restricted work authorization.

E-Verify

The company participates E-Verify ensure eligibility for employment and compliance with Right to Work rules.

Compensation

Salary range: 132K – 183K plus equity and possible bonuses