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Senior Staff Software Engineer, Perception (R4985)

Shield AIWashington, D.C.Flight System Integration
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Salary
$233,760 - $350,640 USD
Job type
Full Time Employee
Posted
28 Jul 2026
Status
Open · checked 7d ago

About this role

Role Overview

Defense is hiring a full-time Senior Staff Software Engineer, Perception in Washington, D.C. to advance how autonomous platforms understand their surroundings. This position suits an experienced engineer who enjoys building advanced artificial intelligence systems and deploying them onto operational autonomous platforms.

Key Responsibilities

Develop and deploy advanced machine learning models that help autonomous systems understand, reason about, and interact with their environments.
Partner with machine learning researchers, autonomy engineers, perception engineers, and platform teams to turn emerging AI capabilities into production-ready systems for defense customers.
Bridge the gap between research and production by building data pipelines, supervised fine-tuning workflows, evaluation frameworks, and deployment infrastructure.
Tackle core perception challenges including object understanding, scene interpretation, and mission-relevant environmental awareness through vision, vision-language, and vision-language-action models.

Requirements

Experience working at the intersection of research and production to deliver reliable, mission-ready perception capabilities.
Ability to collaborate effectively across multidisciplinary teams such as platform, autonomy, and research groups.
Expertise in developing vision, vision-language, and vision-language-action models for autonomous systems.

Skills and Tools

Computer Vision
Machine Learning
Vision-Language Models (VLM)
Vision-Language-Action Models (VLA)
Data Pipelines
Supervised Fine-Tuning (SFT)

Salary and Benefits

The annual salary for this position ranges from $233,760 to $350,640 USD.

About the Company

Defense, operating through Shield AI, is a venture-backed defense technology enterprise dedicated to safeguarding service members and civilians through intelligent systems. The organization produces Hivemind autonomy software, V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and Aechelon simulation and synthetic reality technologies. With a global footprint spanning the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific region, the company actively supports operations worldwide.

How to Apply

Interested candidates should visit the official company careers page to submit an application for this position.

Skills and tech stack

Computer Vision

Questions candidates ask

What is the job title?

The job title is Senior Staff Software Engineer, Perception (R4985).

Where is the position located?

The role is based in Washington, D.C.

What is the salary range for this role?

The annual salary is between $233,760 and $350,640 USD.

What department handles this role?

This position sits within the Flight System Integration department.

How can I apply for this job?

You can apply by visiting the official company careers page.

Ready to apply?

The application is on the official Shield AI careers page.

Apply on company site