Principal Architect – Simulation Engine (Physical AI)
Caterpillar5 days ago
Base Salary
$159k - $259k/yr
Responsibilities
- Define the technical vision, architecture, and roadmap for a simulation platform supporting Physical AI and autonomy development.
- Design core simulation abstractions for worlds, assets, physics, rendering, sensors, scenarios, execution modes, and training-environment interfaces.
- Support deterministic, high-fidelity simulation at a scale of millions of scenario executions per day across GPU clusters.
- Establish measurable standards for simulation fidelity, determinism, performance, and developer experience.
- Lead the sim-to-real correlation program using field and sensor data to validate simulator behavior.
- Develop detailed architecture deliverables and design application infrastructure, including databases, programming languages, utilities, and testing approaches.
- Evaluate and deploy technologies that enhance digital technical capabilities.
- Collaborate with simulation engineering, Digital Twin, AI Factory, autonomy, perception, controls, and machine-engineering teams.
- Serve as an architectural authority across multiple teams, influence senior leaders, and mentor principal, staff, and senior engineers.
Requirements
- Typically 8+ years of software engineering experience with ownership of a production simulation platform for autonomous vehicles or robotics.
- Hands-on experience with NVIDIA Omniverse or Isaac Sim, including Kit, OpenUSD, PhysX, and RTX, and/or Unreal Engine.
- Experience with high-fidelity physics such as multibody dynamics, contact and friction, deformable terrain, granular material, track/tire-ground interaction, hydraulics, and powertrain modeling.
- Experience developing and validating physically based camera, LiDAR, radar, GNSS, and IMU sensor models against real sensor logs.
- Experience with large outdoor terrain, geospatial environments, procedural or generative scenario generation, and ODD-based coverage.
- Familiarity with ASAM OpenSCENARIO, SOTIF, and ISO 26262.
- Experience with Gym-style reinforcement-learning environments and large-scale closed-loop training, with understanding of world foundation models such as NVIDIA Cosmos.
- Experience running simulations on GPU clusters and cloud infrastructure using Kubernetes, Slurm, Ray, and CUDA.
- Expertise in modern C++ and strong Python skills; experience with gRPC, Protocol Buffers, Bazel or CMake, and CI/CD for large monorepos.
- Architecture leadership experience across multiple teams, including influencing senior leaders and mentoring senior technical staff.
- Domain exposure to off-highway, mining, construction autonomy, or AV/robotics simulation.
- Bachelor’s, master’s, or doctoral degree in Computer Science, Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, Physics, or a related field, or equivalent experience.
- Rust or CUDA, Applied Intuition, CARLA, Isaac Lab, MuJoCo, Project Chrono, 3D Gaussian Splatting, and NeRF are additional relevant qualifications.
Benefits
- Medical, dental, and vision benefits are available subject to plan eligibility.
- Paid time off, including vacation, holidays, and volunteer time, is available subject to plan eligibility.
- 401(k) savings plans, Health Savings Accounts, and Flexible Spending Accounts are available subject to plan eligibility.
- Health lifestyle programs, an Employee Assistance Program, voluntary benefits, and employee discounts are available subject to plan eligibility.
- Career development, tuition reimbursement, disability benefits, life insurance, parental leave, and adoption benefits are offered subject to plan eligibility.
- Incentive bonus opportunities are available subject to plan eligibility.
- The position requires full-time work at the Irving, Texas office in Dallas.
- Domestic relocation assistance is available.
- Visa sponsorship is available for this position.
Tech Stack
Categories
Robotics
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.