VP Engineering, Robotaxi

Wayve; Sunnyvale (CA); Hybrid; USD 350,000 - 650,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity stake

Hybrid working

Learning & development budget

Relocation support

Job summary

Wayve is seeking a VP of Engineering for the Robotaxi program in Sunnyvale. You will lead the engineering organization responsible for taking the Robotaxi product from development through deployment and scale, coordinating AI, software, hardware, validation, and fleet operations to ensure safety and reliability.

You will build a world-class team, set technical direction across AI, on-vehicle systems, safety, and performance, and drive milestones while maintaining a strong engineering culture

Qualifications

• Experience leading large autonomous vehicle engineering teams.
• Proficiency in defining technical roadmaps and priorities.
• Strong track record delivering complex, safety-critical systems.

Responsibilities

• Own the engineering strategy and execution for Wayve's Robotaxi program.
• Lead senior engineering leaders and establish clear ownership across teams.
• Drive end-to-end delivery from development to deployment and scale.
• Collaborate with AI, Product, Validation, and Operations to align priorities.
• Maintain high engineering standards while accelerating real-world deployment.

Skills

Engineering leadership

Systems leadership

Autonomous vehicles

Safety-critical software

Cross-functional leadership

Technical strategy

Job description

Before the detail, here's the challenge you'd help us solve.

We build the embodied intelligence that moves real vehicles safely, and the ecosystem a billion machines will run on in the future. Very few people in AI can say this. Every role here, whatever the team, plugs into that.

Here’s what this particular role covers.

About our Engineering Teams

Wayve is building a new generation of autonomous driving technology powered by end-to-end AI. Our Robotaxi Engineering team is responsible for turning that intelligence into a complete Level 4 autonomous driving system that can operate safely and reliably in the real world.

This is one of Wayve’s most important engineering leadership roles. As VP, Engineering, Robotaxi, you will lead the engineering organisation responsible for taking our Robotaxi product from development through deployment and scale.

The challenge is inherently multidisciplinary. Delivering a Robotaxi requires bringing together AI, onboard software, vehicle systems, sensors and compute, safety, validation, simulation and fleet operations into one coherent system.

You will lead across those boundaries, setting the technical direction and building the organisation required to deliver a safe, scalable L4 product.

Your day-to-day

You will own the engineering strategy and execution for Wayve’s Robotaxi program, working closely with leaders across AI, Product, Validation, Vehicle Engineering and Operations.

You will set clear technical priorities for the organisation and ensure teams are solving the right problems in the right order as we move towards increasingly capable driverless operation.

A major part of the role is systems leadership. You will work across the complete autonomous vehicle, understanding how AI behaviour, onboard software, compute, sensors, vehicle interfaces, safety systems and operational infrastructure come together to determine real-world performance.

You will lead and develop senior engineering leaders, create clear ownership across the organisation and build the technical and operating mechanisms required to execute at speed.

YOU’ll also spend significant time close to the product itself, using real-world vehicle performance, testing and data to understand where the system needs to improve and helping teams turn those insights into engineering priorities.

What you’ll be working on

• L4 Robotaxi engineering: Own the engineering roadmap and execution required to develop and deploy Wayve’s Level 4 Robotaxi product.
• End-to-end system leadership: Bring together AI, software, hardware, vehicle systems, validation and operations into a complete autonomous system.
• Driver-out readiness: Drive the engineering work required to progressively remove the safety driver, building confidence through rigorous development, validation and evidence.
• On-vehicle systems: Lead the development and integration of the software and systems that sit between Wayve’s AI Driver and the physical vehicle.
• Safety and reliability: Work closely with Validation, Safety and Engineering teams to build the technical systems and evidence required for safe driverless deployment.
• Real-world performance: Establish tight feedback loops between fleet behaviour, engineering development, validation and release so that what happens on the road directly inform what we build next.
• Technical architecture: Make and influence critical architectural decisions across a complex combination of AI, software, compute, sensors and vehicle systems.
• Engineering execution: Turn ambitious technical goals into clear priorities, ownership and milestones while maintaining a high engineering bar.
• Organisation building: Build, lead and develop a world‑class engineering organisation, including senior engineering leaders and deeply technical individual contributors.
• Cross-functional leadership: Partner closely with Wayve’s AI, Product, Validation, Application Engineering and Operations organisations to deliver the complete Robotaxi product.

You should apply if

• You have led a significant engineering organisation building autonomous vehicles, robotics or another complex real-world autonomous system.
• You have experience developing and deploying safety-critical software and hardware systems in the physical world, rather than purely cloud or consumer software products.
• You have strong technical depth across complex software systems and can operate credibly with senior engineers across AI, embedded software, systems and hardware.
• You understand the challenges involved in taking autonomous technology from development and testing into real-world, production-grade operation.
• You have experience owning a complex product or system end-to-end, rather than leading only one narrow component of the technology stack.
• You have demonstrated strong systems thinking, with the ability to reason across software, hardware, vehicle behaviour, safety, reliability and operational constraints.
• You have built and led large, high-performing engineering organisations and have experience leading senior managers, directors and technical leaders.
• You can combine long-term technical strategy with execution, making difficult prioritisation and architectural decisions while keeping teams moving quickly.
• You are comfortable operating in ambiguity and taking accountability for outcomes where there isn’t an established playbook.
• You care deeply about engineering quality, but know how to balance technical excellence with the urgency required to get technology into the real world.
• You are an exceptional cross-functional leader who can bring together teams with very different technical disciplines around a shared outcome.

Experience delivering L4 autonomous vehicles or Robotaxi systems would be particularly valuable, but we are also interested in exceptional engineering leaders from adjacent fields such as robotics, autonomous trucking, aerospace, defence autonomy or other safety-critical physical AI systems.

Not ticking every box? That’s totally okay! If you’re passionate about autonomy and keen to learn, we encourage you to apply even if you don’t meet every requirement.

More about Wayve:

Wayve is building the leading AI platform for autonomous driving. We are pioneering an end to end AI approach that enables vehicles to learn directly from real world experience, developing the ability to adapt, generalise and improve at scale. Instead of relying on hand coded rules or pre mapped environments, our AI Driver learns to drive by understanding the world around it. The result is technology that navigates complex urban environments with intelligence, precision and natural flow, unlocking meaningful advances in both safety and efficiency. We believe autonomy represents a once in a generation transformation in how people and goods move, comparable to the shift from horses to cars, and from human driven vehicles to intelligent machines.

Our ambition is to make autonomy universal. Wayve’s mapless and hardware agnostic AI platform integrates with global OEM partners, enabling continuous software evolution and unlocking advanced levels of automation from L2 plus through to L4 as our core AI model scales. In a race increasingly defined by intelligence and real world learning, Wayve is taking a distinct approach, building a generalisable driving intelligence that can power any vehicle, anywhere. By combining embodied AI with scalable deployment, we are creating technology that can be shaped to each OEM brand and driver experience, accelerating the transition to a safer, more intelligent future of mobility.

How we work - Locations & Flexible Working:

Our main hubs are in London, Sunnyvale, Yokohama, Herzliya, Vancouver and Leonberg. We operate a hybrid working model that combines in-person collaboration in our dedicated office spaces with focused time working remotely. This gives our teams the connection and energy of working together, alongside the flexibility to do their best work in a way that fits their lives.

What’s in it for you (Location dependant):

• Salaries benchmarked against the market annually
• Meaningful equity, sharing in the ownership and long term success of Wayve
• Relocation support and visa sponsorship where applicable
• Hybrid working, core hours and the chance to work hands on in vehicle workshops and labs
• Learning and development budgets with support for training, conferences and growth
• Comprehensive benefits including health insurance, dental, enhanced maternity and paternity leave, retirement or pension where applicable, access to therapists, wellbeing partnerships, team socials and more

A quick, honest note before you apply.

If that sounds like the kind of problem you want to spend your time on, we’d really like to hear from you.

At Wayve we're committed to creating a diverse, fair and respectful culture that is inclusive of everyone based on their unique skills and perspectives, and regardless of sex, race, religion or belief, ethnic or national origin, disability, age, citizenship, marital, domestic or civil partnership status, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, pregnancy or related condition (including breastfeeding) or any other basis as protected by applicable law.

For more information visit Careers at Wayve. To learn more about what drives us, visit Values at Wayve

DISCLAIMER: We will not ask about marriage or pregnancy, care responsibilities or disabilities in any of our job adverts or interviews. However, we do look to capture information about care responsibilities, and disabilities among other diversity information as part of an optional DEI Monitoring form to help us identify areas of improvement in our hiring process and ensure that the process is inclusive and non-discriminatory.