Senior Robotics Software Engineer – Lunar Rover Localization

Starpath

Starpath develops and manufactures the technologies that will enable humans to live on the Moon and Mars. Today, we are building robotic systems that locally produce the essential commodities a lunar civilization will require at extreme scale: water, power, and oxygen. Our ultimate goal is to build and operate a self-sustaining city on Mars.

Senior Robotics Software Engineer - Lunar Rover Localization

In this role, you will own the software for accurately determining and tracking the position of our lunar rovers as they navigate on the surface of the Moon. This position requires strong technical understanding of localization algorithms and hands-on experience getting localization systems to work robustly on real robots in the real world. The right candidate for this job is someone who can decide on a technical approach, write the software to implement that approach, test the system on the real rover and in simulation, evaluate the performance of the system, understand where it works well and where it works poorly, decide whether to refine this approach or pivot to a different approach, and repeat this entire cycle quickly.

Starpath is a fast-paced, zero-bureaucracy work environment, and the people who thrive here are those who enjoy working hard, facing difficult challenges, and making rapid progress toward an ambitious vision of the future. Our goal is to launch our rovers to the Moon within the next 1-2 years, demonstrate industrial-scale ISRU for refueling landers, and pave the way for a permanent human lunar base.

Responsibilities

• Design a technical approach that addresses the specific challenges of rover localization on the Moon
• Develop software for accurately determining the position of our rover on the lunar surface based on sensor data (e.g. IMU, cameras, LIDAR, odometry, star tracker, sun sensors, terrain matching)
• Test and evaluate localization performance on our rover prototypes at our lunar analog test site
• Test and evaluate localization performance in Gazebo-based mission simulations based on NASA lunar terrain data
• Work closely with other members of the software team to integrate localization with other parts of our autonomy system (e.g. path planning, hazard avoidance)

Required Qualifications

• 5+ years experience programming in Python and/or C/C++
• Experience developing software to control real robots
• Experience with non-GPS robot localization techniques (e.g. INS, EKF, factor graphs, SLAM)
• Evidence of exceptional engineering ability
• Degree in Computer Science or a related field OR demonstrated excellence at coding via significant professional experience
• Outstanding communications skills
• A desire to make humans a multi-planet species

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with outdoor robots and/or autonomous vehicles
• Experience with robots operating in natural terrain
• Experience with LIDAR-based localization (e.g. LIDAR odometry, LIDAR SLAM)
• Experience with vision-based localization (e.g. visual odometry, VSLAM)
• Experience with terrain matching techniques for localization
• Experience programming in ROS/ROS2
• Experience with robot simulators (e.g. Gazebo, Mujuco)
• Experience developing software for aerospace applications
• Experience developing and deploying software in production

Position Details

• Location: Los Angeles - Hawthorne
• Salary base rate is $145-185k/yr plus equity package; compensation scales with candidate experience
• PTO & health/dental/vision coverage included
• EAR REQUIREMENTS:
• To conform to U.S. Government export regulations, applicant must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (aka green card holder), (iii) Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or (iv) Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.