Software Engineer - Embedded Systems (Cleared)

Swoop Search; Minneapolis (MN); On-site; USD 130,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity offers

Job summary

Swoop Technologies, located in Minneapolis, seeks an embedded systems engineer to develop and maintain firmware critical for operating system functionalities. The role demands experience in OS/Kernel development and proficiency in C and Rust. You'll work on innovative projects influencing AI and robotics.

Offering a competitive salary range of $130K – $190K, the position also includes equity along with an equal opportunity employer commitment.

Qualifications

• Active TS Clearance.
• 4+ years of experience in OS/Kernel development or Firmware design.
• Travel Requirement - 5-20%.

Responsibilities

• Develop embedded system firmware including low-level drivers.
• Contribute to OS integration and kernel-level modules.
• Design application-layer features optimizing for performance.

Skills

Operating System/Kernel development

Embedded Systems/Firmware design

Software development in C

Software development in Rust

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Low-level hardware systems knowledge

Job description

About Swoop:

Swoop Technologies has a mission to organize and make accessible the world’s military and critical infrastructure. We are building a distributed operating system, SwoopOS, that decomposes the world’s equipment into a distributed combined robotic embodiment upon which a new generation of distributed systems, autonomous systems, and agentic AI can be built and deployed using our SDK, Valhalla, and operated via our browser, Surf. Imagine the world’s equipment - consisting of the electrical grid, communications architectures, manufacturing facilities, and militaries as a trapped supply of inputs possessing the potential to ensure Western military advantage, sovereign control of economically competitive manufacturing capacity, or the creation of a grid that fosters energy dominance. Swoop is liberating these trapped assets, allowing them to contribute to the world’s future as a series of building blocks to be combined at the speed of software, limited by only the hard constraints of physics and the soft constraints of safety. That is what Swoop is building. Not in the data center or cloud or edge on‑premise computing node. In the physical world.

Impact:

Joining our Edge Team means you will get to work on building an operating system. Not an abstraction, virtualization, or data layer. A legitimate distributed operating system. This OS has to work across heterogeneous instruction sets, support a new generation of distributed system abstractions, treat security as a first principle, and work at the scale of power grids and entire militaries. You will influence the intersection of artificial intelligence, robotics, and the physical world - building a compute model the OS schedules and executes across the most geopolitically relevant problem sets. It is a bad‑ass problem where every member of the team contributes tangibly on a daily basis. Come join us in either our Minneapolis or Washington, DC offices.

Responsibilities:

• Develop and maintain embedded system firmware including low-level drivers, bootloaders, and other OS‑critical functions to enable reliable OS initialization and hardware interaction.

• Contribute to OS integration and kernel‑level modules, ensuring efficient communication between hardware abstraction layers and higher‑level system software.

• Design and implement application‑layer features and system services that leverage firmware interfaces, optimizing for performance, resource use, and robustness.

• Collaborate cross‑functionally with other engineering teams to debug complex issues spanning firmware, operating system, and application boundaries.

• Collaborate closely with the deployment engineering team, solving technical challenges for various customer requirements

Minimum Qualifications:

• Active TS Clearance

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering or related technical field, or equivalent technical experience

• 4+ years of experience in one or more of the following: Operating System/Kernel development, RTOS, Embedded Systems/Firmware design, Microkernel development, Bare Metal development

• Software development experience in C and Rust

• Understanding of low level hardware systems

• Travel Requirement - 5-20%

Preferred Qualifications

• Knowledge of one or more of the following: Microcontrollers, SoC, device drivers, hardware bringup, power management, ARM processors, performance optimization, file systems, bootloading, firmware, x86 assembly, system BIOS, FPGAs or hardware/software integration

• Understanding of clocks and timing as it pertains to processor instructions

• Familiarity with serial protocols such as I2C, SPI, UART, USB

• Demonstrated knowledge of systems engineering and distributed systems

Swoop Technologies is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, national origin, disability, protected veteran status, gender identity or any other factor protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws.

Compensation

$130K – $190K Offers Equity

Our salary ranges are determined by role and location, and reflect the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries across the US. Within this range, compensation for this position will be determined by work location, relevant qualifications, experience, job‑related skills, market conditions, and other factors.