What are the responsibilities and job description for the Software Engineer (Drone Avionics) position at Thermopylae Aerospace?
Company Description
Thermopylae Aerospace Corporation is developing a novel air defense platform designed to counter hostile drones. We are a small, highly focused team of engineers driven by a shared mission to deliver a new and critical capability for the United States.
Role Description
This is a full-time, on-site role for a Software Engineer – Autonomy & Infrastructure, based in Hawthorne, CA. The engineer will be responsible for designing, building, and maintaining the autonomy software stack that powers our high-performance interceptor drones. This includes developing core autonomy algorithms, building scalable autonomy infrastructure, integrating perception and control modules, and ensuring reliable real-time performance in safety-critical environments.
You will work across flight software, mission autonomy, backend services, and simulation tooling to accelerate the development of intelligent unmanned systems. The role requires a strong systems mindset, hands-on engineering approach, and the ability to collaborate closely with robotics, GNC, avionics, and test teams to rapidly iterate and deploy autonomous capabilities
Qualifications
- Develop autonomy algorithms for guidance, navigation, decision-making, and multi-sensor integration
- Build and maintain autonomy infrastructure, including mission stacks, real-time services, data pipelines, and testing frameworks
- Design modular, high-reliability software components for onboard autonomy and ground systems
- Integrate perception, control, and planning systems into cohesive end-to-end autonomy pipelines
- Implement scalable backend services that support simulation, telemetry, mission monitoring, and operator interfaces
- Optimize algorithms and systems for real-time performance, robustness, and safety
- Debug complex autonomy behaviors using flight logs, simulation data, and hardware-in-the-loop testing
- Collaborate with avionics, GNC, embedded systems, and hardware teams to ensure seamless software–hardware integration
- Contribute to architectural decisions, best practices, and overall system reliability
- Support field testing, rapid prototyping, and continuous deployment of autonomy features