Staff Software Engineer, Perception (R5421)

Shield AI; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 140,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

Shield AI is seeking a senior machine learning leader to drive the technical development of perception systems for autonomous platforms. You will own the architecture and model development across several initiatives and work closely with researchers, perception engineers, autonomy engineers, and platform teams to translate AI research into reliable, production-ready capabilities.

You will mentor engineers, raise technical standards, and shape how foundation models are adapted, evaluated, and

Responsibilities

• Lead the technical development of advanced ML solutions for autonomous perception.
• Own architecture and model development across multiple efforts.
• Mentor engineers and raise the technical bar across the organization.

Job description

Founded in 2015, 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 and V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft. 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.

The Hivemind Solutions Perception team develops the next generation of perception capabilities for autonomous systems by combining state-of-the-art machine learning with the proven foundations of computer vision. The team advances how autonomous platforms understand and interpret the world by developing vision, vision-language (VLM), and vision-language-action (VLA) models that tackle core perception challenges such as object understanding, scene interpretation, and mission-relevant environmental awareness. Working at the intersection of research and production, our engineers build the data pipelines, supervised fine-tuning (SFT) workflows, evaluation frameworks, and deployment infrastructure needed to transform cutting-edge AI research into reliable, mission-ready perception capabilities.

In this role, you'll lead the technical development of advanced machine learning solutions that define the future of perception for autonomous systems. You'll own the team's most challenging technical problems, drive architecture and model development across multiple efforts, and influence how foundation models are adapted, evaluated, and deployed for real-world autonomy. Working closely with researchers, perception engineers, autonomy engineers, and platform teams, you'll bridge cutting-edge AI research with scalable production systems while mentoring engineers and raising the technical bar across the organization.