Senior Staff Software Engineer, Perception (R4985)

Shield; San Diego (CA); On-site; USD 235,000 - 352,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Bonus

Benefits

Job summary

Shield AI in San Diego seeks a senior ML engineer to design and deploy state-of-the-art vision models for autonomous systems. You will build scalable data pipelines and evaluation loops, and optimize models for embedded hardware.

Collaborate across perception, autonomy, and software teams to translate research into production capabilities, balancing performance and reliability. A SECRET clearance is required and expertise in PyTorch, TensorFlow, TensorRT, ONNX, C++, and Python is highly valued.

Qualifications

• Typically requires a minimum of 10 years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree; or 9 years and a Master’s degree; or 7 years with a PhD; or equivalent work experience.
• Mastery of machine learning fundamentals.
• Experience training and deploying ML models for computer vision in a production setting.
• Strong understanding of 3D vision problems/algorithms.
• Proficiency with PyTorch and TensorFlow.
• Expertise deploying models using TensorRT and ONNX.
• Proficiency in C++ and Python.
• Ability to obtain a SECRET clearance.

Responsibilities

• Model Development – Design, train, fine-tune, and maintain state-of-the-art vision models for autonomous systems.
• Data Pipelines & Model Training – Build scalable pipelines and evaluation loops for mission-relevant tasks.
• Model Deployment & Optimization – Deploy models for embedded hardware using ONNX, TensorRT, and related frameworks.
• Perception & Autonomy Applications – Apply ML to perception and autonomy across aerial systems.
• Cross-functional Collaboration – Partner with perception, autonomy, platform, and software teams.
• Model Evaluation & Validation – Develop benchmarks and evaluation frameworks to guide improvements.
• Continuous Improvement – Improve training infrastructure and deployment workflows.

Skills

ML fundamentals

Vision models

3D vision

PyTorch

TensorFlow

TensorRT

ONNX

C++

Python

SECRET clearance

Education

Bachelor's degree (or higher)

Master's degree

PhD

Tools

PyTorch

TensorFlow

TensorRT

ONNX

Job description

Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include Hivemind autonomy software, V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and Aechelon simulation and synthetic reality technologies. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube.

What You’ll Do

• Model Development – Design, train, fine-tune, and maintain state-of-the-art vision, vision-language, and vision-language-action models that improve perception and decision-making for autonomous systems.
• Data Pipelines & Model Training – Build scalable data pipelines, supervised fine-tuning (SFT) workflows, and evaluation loops that continuously improve model performance on mission-relevant tasks.
• Model Deployment & Optimization – Deploy and optimize machine learning models for embedded hardware using technologies such as ONNX, TensorRT, and hardware-accelerated inference frameworks.
• Perception & Autonomy Applications – Apply modern machine learning techniques to solve challenging perception and autonomy problems across aerial and other autonomous systems operating in complex, real-world environments.
• Research-to-Production – Translate cutting-edge machine learning research into production-ready capabilities by balancing model performance, robustness, computational efficiency, and operational reliability.
• Cross-functional Collaboration – Partner closely with perception, autonomy, platform, and software engineering teams to integrate machine learning capabilities into mission-ready autonomous systems.
• Model Evaluation & Validation – Develop benchmarks, testing methodologies, and evaluation frameworks to measure model performance, identify failure modes, and guide future improvements.
• Continuous Improvement – Improve training infrastructure, developer tooling, deployment workflows, and model lifecycle management to accelerate experimentation and production delivery.

Required Qualifications

• Typically requires a minimum of 10 years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree; or 9 years and a Master’s degree; or 7 years with a PhD; or equivalent work experience.
• Mastery of machine learning fundamentals.
• Experience training an deploying ML models for computer vision in a production setting.
• Strong understanding of 3D vision problems/algorithms.
• Experience with machine learning frameworks such as PyTorch and TensorFlow.
• Demonstrated expertise in deploying models using TensorRT and ONNX.
• Proficiency in C++ and Python.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to translate research into practical applications.
• Ability to obtain a SECRET clearance

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with developing autonomous systems for defense customers.
• Experience with training/finetuning vision-language models, vision-language-action models, and/or world models.
• Contributions to open-source projects in machine learning or computer vision.
• Track record of publications in leading computer vision and robotics conferences and journals (e.g., CVPR, ICCV/ECCV, RAL, ICRA).

Full-time Regular Employee Offer Package

Pay within range listed + Bonus + Benefits + Equity

Temporary Employee Offer Package

Pay within range listed above + temporary benefits package (applicable after 60 days of employment)

Salary compensation is influenced by a wide array of factors including but not limited to skill set, level of experience, licenses and certifications, and specific work location. All offers are contingent on a cleared background and possible reference check. Military fellows and part-time employees are not eligible for benefits. Please speak to your talent acquisition representative for more information.

Shield AI is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.

Compensation Range: $234,880 - $352,320