Senior / Staff Software Engineer, Mapping

Waabi; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 141,000 - 242,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive compensation & equity

Health, dental & vision

Unlimited vacation

Flexible hours & WFH

Daily meals & snacks

Team events

Evolution of perks

Job summary

Waabi, a leader in AI-powered autonomous technology, seeks a Senior/Staff Software Engineer for the Mapping team in the US. You will help build scalable HD maps, design robust pipelines, and collaborate across robotics, deep learning, and software disciplines.

You will contribute to low-latency, highly available systems for a growing autonomous fleet, with opportunities for equity and impact across the company’s cutting-edge roadmap.

Qualifications

• BS/MS/PhD in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or related field.
• Experience delivering production-grade software at scale.
• Strong CS fundamentals and cloud experience.

Responsibilities

• RAMP UP quickly across domains and bridge backend pipelines, API design, and vehicle-side serving.
• Work on HD mapping infrastructure with AI-driven approaches at scale.
• Build robust data pipelines for ingestion, validation, and visualization.
• Design metrics, observability, and anomaly detection across systems.
• Collaborate with perception, motion planning, and simulation teams to design intuitive APIs.
• Engineer low-latency, high-availability systems for self-driving fleets.

Skills

Python

C++

Rust

Distributed systems

APIs

Cloud platforms

Education

BS in Computer Science / Electrical Engineering

MS or PhD in related field

Tools

Apache Spark

Airflow

Ray

Kafka

Job description

Waabi, founded by AI visionary Raquel Urtasun, is the leader in Physical AI. With a world-class team, we're unlocking the next era of autonomous transportation with technology that's powering commercial autonomous trucks and robotaxis. Waabi is backed by and partners with world leaders in AI, automotive, logistics, and deep tech.

With offices in Toronto, San Francisco, Dallas, and Pittsburgh, Waabi is growing quickly and looking for diverse, innovative and collaborative candidates who want to impact the world in a positive way. To learn more visit: www.waabi.ai

The Mapping team at Waabi develops the foundational spatial intelligence of our autonomous fleet. As a Senior or Staff Software Engineer on our Mapping team, you will act as a versatile, foundational builder for our highly scalable, AI-driven mapping infrastructure. We are looking for a strong software generalist who thrives on variety, can easily pivot across different projects, and tackles complex distributed systems problems from data ingestion to real-time serving.

You will collaborate and exchange ideas with our team, which includes world-renowned engineers and scientists specializing in robotics, deep learning, computer vision, and autonomous driving. We value original, high-impact ideas and rigorous experimental validation.

You will...

• Act as a versatile engineering powerhouse, quickly ramping up on new domains and fluidly transitioning between backend pipelines, API design, and vehicle-side serving.
• Be part of a multidisciplinary team of Engineers and Research Scientists using AI-first approach to create high-definition (HD) maps at scale.
• Architect and build the engineering foundations of our long-term mapping infrastructure.
• Build robust, scalable pipelines to automatically create, validate, maintain, and visualize massive amounts of data.
• Design and develop comprehensive metrics, observability, and anomaly detection across various systems.
• Partner directly with downstream customers (e.g. Perception, Motion Planning, Simulation) to capture complex requirements and implement intuitive APIs.
• Engineer real-time, high-availability, and low-latency systems for fleet of self-driving vehicles.

Qualifications:

• BS, MS, or PhD in Computer Scientist, Electrical Engineering, or related field, with a minimum for 5 years of industry experience.
• Strong computer science fundamentals with an aptitude and willingness to quickly learn domain-specific concepts like 3D geometry and spatial data structures.
• Prove ability to work across various programming languages, seamlessly bridging high-level Python development with robust systems-level engineering in C++ or Rust.
• Solid experience in designing, developing, and deploying production-quality, fault-tolerant software at scale (moving well beyond prototypes/proofs of concept).
• Hands-on experience building distributed systems on modern cloud platforms.

Bonus/nice to have:

• A true generalist mindset: you enjoy wearing multiple hats, diving into unfamiliar codebases, and picking up new technologies as the mission dictates.
• Prior experience with autonomous vehicles, HD mapping, or robotics.
• Familiarity with 3D geometry, geospatial systems, spatial databases, and tooling such as QGIS, GDAL, or PostGIS.
• Familiarity with Machine Learning pipelines or integrating AI models into production engineering systems.
• Experience with large-scale data processing systems and orchestration framework (e.g., Apache Spark, Airflow, Ray, Kafka).
• Open-minded and collaborative team player with strong willingness to help others.

The US yearly salary range for this role is: $141,000 - $242,000 USD in addition to competitive perks & benefits. Waabi (US) Inc.’s yearly salary ranges are determined based on several factors in accordance with the Company’s compensation practices. The salary base range is reflective of the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for the position across all US locations. Note: The Company provides additional compensation for employees in this role, including equity incentive awards and an annual performance bonus.

Waabi is a technology start-up building technologies to transform the way the world moves. Join our talented team to be a part of the future and to make an impact!

Perks/Benefits:

• Competitive compensation and equity awards.
• Health and Wellness benefits encompassing Medical, Dental and Vision coverage (for full-time employees only).
• Unlimited Vacation.
• Flexible hours and Work from Home support.
• Daily drinks, snacks and catered meals (when in office).
• Regularly scheduled team building activities and social events both on-site, off-site & virtually.
• As we grow, this list continues to evolve!

Waabi is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating a supportive, inclusive, and accessible workplace for all our employees. We seek applicants of all backgrounds and identities, across race, color, ethnicity, national origin or ancestry, age, citizenship, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, military or veteran status, marital status, pregnancy or parental status, caregiver status, disability, or any other characteristic protected by law. We make workplace accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities as required by applicable law. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process please let our recruiting team know.