Principal Engineer, Digital Twin and Simulation Platform
Caterpillar2 days ago
Base Salary
$159k - $259k/yr
Responsibilities
- Define the end-to-end digital twin and simulation reference architecture.
- Build reusable software for machines, terrain, sites, sensors, behaviors, scenarios, and visualization.
- Lead OpenUSD asset and scene pipelines, including layers, references, payloads, variants, schemas, materials, and metadata.
- Develop NVIDIA Omniverse Kit extensions and integrate CAD, GIS, terrain, machine, sensor, and operational data.
- Establish APIs and data contracts across simulation, robotics, AI, controls, and enterprise platforms.
- Lead rendering, scene management, mapping, and physically based visualization capabilities.
- Define standards for fidelity, determinism, performance, interoperability, model versioning, and reuse.
- Enable containerized simulation workloads across local, on-premises, and CoreWeave GPU environments.
- Own a major technical capability across multiple teams and programs, leading architecture reviews, technical investigations, and design decisions.
- Translate ambiguous business and engineering problems into scalable architectures and production software balancing research and prototyping with secure, maintainable delivery.
- Mentor senior and developing engineers and support technical hiring and onboarding.
- Partner with simulation, robotics, autonomy, controls, AI, data, cloud, product, and customer-facing organizations.
Requirements
- Seven or more years of hands-on backend software development and five or more years of frontend or visualization development.
- Advanced software engineering experience with Python and one or more of C++, C#, Java, Go, or Node.js.
- Strong API and backend architecture experience with REST, GraphQL, event-driven interfaces, SQL, NoSQL, object storage, distributed systems, automated testing, CI/CD, source control, and observability.
- Experience with cloud platforms and cloud-native architectures, including Docker and Kubernetes.
- Expertise with NVIDIA Omniverse, Omniverse Kit SDK, OpenUSD, RTX rendering, and SimReady asset concepts.
- Experience with NVIDIA Isaac Sim and robotics simulation integration into digital twin environments.
- Experience with NVIDIA Newton or comparable GPU-accelerated physics engines for terrain, contact, rigid-body, and machine interaction modeling.
- Experience with Unreal Engine, Unity, or equivalent real-time 3D platforms.
- Experience with GIS and mapping technologies such as Cesium, Mapbox, OpenLayers, terrain meshes, and coordinate reference systems.
- Experience with TypeScript, React, Next.js, Angular, HTML, and CSS.
- Experience deploying GPU simulation and rendering workloads using CoreWeave, Kubernetes, Docker, and NVIDIA Container Toolkit.
- Experience defining simulation architecture across multiple products or engineering teams and leading architecture and technical delivery across teams.
- Experience connecting simulation systems with machine, robotics, autonomy, or operational data and with automated map-to-OpenUSD or site-to-simulation pipelines.
- Strong communication, mentoring, problem-solving, and cross-functional collaboration skills.
- Experience using AI-assisted development tools such as GitHub Copilot, Claude, or Cursor.
Benefits
- Medical, dental, and vision benefits.
- Paid time off including vacation, holidays, and volunteer time.
- 401(k) savings plans, Health Savings Account, and Flexible Spending Accounts.
- Health lifestyle programs, Employee Assistance Program, voluntary benefits, and employee discounts.
- Career development, incentive bonus, disability benefits, life insurance, parental leave, adoption benefits, and tuition reimbursement.
- Full-time onsite work at the Irving, Texas office, five days per week.
- Domestic relocation assistance is available.
- Visa sponsorship is available for eligible applicants.
Tech Stack
AngularC#C++CSSDockerGoGraphQLHTMLJavaKubernetesNext.jsNode.jsPythonReactSQLTypeScriptUnityUnreal Engine
About Caterpillar
Caterpillar Inc. designs, manufactures, and services construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines, and diesel-electric locomotives for infrastructure, resource, and energy customers. The public company, founded in 1925 and headquartered in Irving, Texas, sells primarily through an independent worldwide dealer network and provides equipment financing. It operates through Construction Industries, Resource Industries, and Energy & Transportation segments, with shares traded on the NYSE and Euronext Paris.