Staff Software Engineer, Autonomous Pilot Integration – Emerging Domains (R5401) at Shield AI
San Diego, CA
$195,200–$292,800
Jul 20, 2026
San Diego, CA
Jul 22, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A senior technical leadership role focused on building and integrating autonomy software for novel platforms in domains such as space, maritime, and unmanned logistics. The work spans the full development cycle — from early R&D and software-in-the-loop testing through live operational deployments — including mission behaviors, platform interfaces, and multi-agent coordination. Suits an experienced autonomy or systems integration engineer comfortable driving technical direction across cross-functional teams in fast-changing program environments.
Senior level · 7+ years · San Diego, CA · Secret clearance · Full-time
Pay in the description: $195,200–$292,800
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $166,860 (middle half $131,418–$198,246). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (8)
Shield AI lists offices across the U.S. but does not specify a single primary location for this role; San Diego, CA is used as the CBSA because that is Shield AI's headquarters city. The role involves 10–20% travel to customer sites, test events, and integration exercises.
The job title carries no explicit seniority level; 'Unspecified' is used for advertised seniority. The 7+ years requirement and scope (leading feature crews, owning end-to-end delivery, influencing technical direction across teams) support a Senior classification.
BS/MS is listed as a requirement but the posting explicitly accepts 'equivalent practical experience,' so no minimum degree is flagged as a hard gate.
The role is classified as Software Developers (15-1252) because the primary day-to-day work is writing and owning autonomy software (mission behaviors, platform control, multi-agent coordination) end-to-end. 15-1299 is noted as a runner-up given the embedded/autonomy systems focus that sits at the edge of standard software development.
UCI, OMS, and STANAG 4586 are listed together under Preferred Qualifications as interchangeable interoperability standards; they are captured as a single preferred skill with alternatives.
Experience with autonomous aircraft, maritime, or space systems and experience mentoring engineers are listed under Preferred Qualifications but name no specific concrete technology, so they are omitted per extraction rules.
The HivemindSDK and ViDAR/ATR are mentioned as internal Shield AI products in narrative/team-context sections only, not as candidate requirements, so they are not extracted as skills.
Requires a Secret clearance — the cleared population is a small fraction of this occupation, so the real candidate pool is materially smaller than the estimate below, which does not model clearance.
Read the full posting
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