Staff Modeling & Simulation Engineer: AI Flight Systems

Shieldai; San Diego (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Bonus

Benefits

Job summary

Shield AI is seeking a Staff Modeling & Simulation Engineer in the San Diego area to design, build, and scale aircraft subsystem models and automation tooling for next-gen XBAT products.

You will develop robust simulation pipelines, run V&V analyses, and drive performance engineering across software, hardware, and flight dynamics teams to ensure safe, reliable, and fast AI-enabled aircraft testing and deployment.

Qualifications

• BS or MS in Computer Science, Aerospace, Robotics, or related field.
• 7+ years of experience in simulation software development with emphasis on modern C++ and performance optimization.
• Strong understanding of rigid-body dynamics, kinematics, aerodynamics, and sensor mechanics.
• Proven experience developing or integrating simulation systems for robotics, aerospace, and autonomous systems.
• Ability to debug complex build and runtime environments (CMake, package management, logging, and profiling tools).
• Experience with software testing tools (GTest, etc.).
• Experience with simulation V&V and cross-disciplinary collaboration.

Responsibilities

• Develop models and infrastructure for the integrated simulation pipeline in C++.
• Design deterministic, high-performance simulation tools capable of faster-than-real-time execution for development, testing, and release.
• Implement test scenarios and write unit, system, and regression tests.
• Collaborate across autonomy, embedded, GNC, and test engineering to ensure the simulation mirrors real aircraft behavior and mission scenarios.
• Contribute to platform-agnostic simulation tooling to accelerate current and future aircraft design and development efforts.
• Perform verification and validation (V&V) analysis on modeling tools.
• Conduct system performance analysis and generate reports and visualizations.
• Utilize best practices in C++, simulation architecture, and performance engineering.

Skills

Modern C++

Performance optimization

Rigid-body dynamics

Kinematics & Aerodynamics

Sensor mechanics

GTest

Debugging build/run (CMake)

Collaboration & communication

DevOps & CI/CD

Python for data analysis

Education

BS or MS in Computer Science, Aerospace, Robotics, or related field

Tools

CMake

GTest

Job description

Shield AI is seeking a Staff Modeling & Simulation Engineer in the San Diego area to design, build, and scale aircraft subsystem models and automation tooling for next-gen XBAT products.

You will develop robust simulation pipelines, run V&V analyses, and drive performance engineering across software, hardware, and flight dynamics teams to ensure safe, reliable, and fast AI-enabled aircraft testing and deployment.