Senior/Staff Software Engineer - Scene Understanding

The Motion Planning Scene Understanding team at Zoox is dedicated to improving the driving behaviors of our robots with Motion Planning capabilities to navigate through challenging environments.

We are looking for people passionate about working with robots, creating next-generation algorithmic improvements, applying cutting-edge AI, and deploying production quality software to Zoox’s vehicles to be able to handle highly complex scenes. Driving in a dynamic urban environment may include road closures, partial obstructions, unexpected hazards, false signage, and abnormal traffic patterns.

At Zoox, you will work closely with teams including mapping, perception, prediction, planning, safety, and operations to ensure that Zoox vehicles can drive in the world safely and serve our riders reliably.

In this role, you will:

• Design software architectures that combine both learned and classical methods that are integrated with motion planning
• Create principled algorithmic improvements and machine learning models to improve on-vehicle performance and behaviors 
• Leverage our large-scale data pipelines and machine learning infrastructure to research, prototype, and deploy new solutions to improve driving behavior
• Plan and lead large cross-functional initiatives
• Present work proposals & artifacts to leadership and technical mentoring of team members

Qualifications

• BS, MS, or PhD Computer Science or related field within Robotics; 3+ years of experience
• Experience with training and deploying machine learning models
• Experience with production machine learning pipelines, dataset creation, training frameworks, and metrics pipelines
• Understanding of configuration spaces and real-time motion planning algorithms (A*, RRTs, PRMs, etc.)
• Fluency in C++, Python, PyTorch, TensorFlow

Bonus Qualifications

• Prior experience with successful deployment of products in autonomous robotics and/or a safety critical product industry
• Prior experience with sensor fusion, 3D data representation, motion planning, machine learning pipelines & architectures
• Publications in the fields of machine learning and/or robotics within academia or industry venues

Compensation

There are three major components to compensation for this position: salary, Amazon Restricted Stock Units (RSUs), and Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights. The salary will range from $230,000 to $332,000. A sign-on bonus may be part of a compensation package. Compensation will vary based on geographic location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.

Zoox also offers a comprehensive package of benefits including paid time off (e.g. sick leave, vacation, bereavement), unpaid time off, Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights, Amazon RSUs, health insurance, long-term care insurance, long-term and short-term disability insurance, and life insurance.