Base Salary
$170k - $240k/yr
Responsibilities
- Design, implement, and evolve the foundational simulator architecture across vehicle types, environments, and use cases.
- Improve physics models for vehicle motion, environmental interactions, and dynamic agents.
- Build high-fidelity simulations of cameras, IMUs, and other onboard components, including timing, noise, and hardware behavior.
- Run and validate the full Skydio autonomy stack in simulation to align simulated and real-world behavior.
- Develop simulator features for customer and internal autonomy-engineering workflows, including training scenarios and advanced testing modes.
- Profile and optimize simulator performance while improving realism and accuracy.
- Develop core simulator components in C++ and Python under real-time constraints.
- Collaborate with autonomy, perception, and controls engineers; debug interactions among physics, sensors, autonomy logic, and rendering.
- Help shape the simulator’s long-term technical direction as a product and internal platform.
- Contribute to simulator documentation and shared technical understanding.
Requirements
- Strong software engineering experience with C++ and Python.
- Experience building complex systems where performance, determinism, or correctness matter.
- Comfort reasoning about time-synchronized systems, state machines, or real-time execution.
- Ability to work in a large, evolving codebase with multiple stakeholders.
- Interest in robotics, simulation, or physical systems; prior robotics experience is a plus but not required.
- Robotics, simulation, game engines, or real-time systems experience is a bonus.
- Experience with physics engines, sensor modeling, hardware abstraction layers, multithreaded or low-latency system design, or debugging systems spanning software and physical behavior is a bonus.
Benefits
- Regular, full-time employees are eligible for company group health insurance plans.
- Benefits include paid vacation time, sick leave, holiday pay, and a 401(k) savings plan.
- Relocation assistance may be provided for eligible roles.
- This is a regular, full-time position subject to applicable laws and company eligibility policies.
About Skydio
Skydio is the leading U.S.-based drone manufacturer and the world leader in autonomous flight technology. We leverage breakthrough artificial intelligence to create flying robots that are easier to operate, safer to fly, and more capable in complex environments. Our systems are trusted by more than 3,800 agencies and organizations across the U.S. military, public safety, and critical infrastructure sectors. Skydio Drone as First Responder (DFR) programs now operate in 42 states, and more than 16M Americans live within the response zone of a DFR Dock. In total, Skydio supports more than 1,200 public safety agencies – double the number from a year ago. More than 250 utilities rely on Skydio for inspection programs that improve reliability and worker safety. In national security, they are supporting mission-critical operations both on the battlefield and across military installations, keeping our nation and our allies secure. Founded in 2014, Skydio designs, assembles, and supports its products in the U.S., with headquarters in San Mateo, CA, and manufacturing facilities in Hayward, CA. We are the largest drone manufacturer in the U.S. and have shipped more than 60,000 flying robots. The company is backed by top investors and strategic partners, including Andreessen Horowitz, Linse Capital, N47, IVP, Playground, and NVIDIA.