Staff Engineer, Systems (R4624)

San DiegoFull Time Employeelead

OtherStaff Engineer

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Founded in 2015, Shield AI is a venture-backed deep-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems.

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OtherStaff Engineer

Founded in 2015, Shield AI is a venture-backed deep-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include the V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, Hivemind Enterprise, and the Hivemind Vision product lines. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube.

The Hivemind Platform Team at Shield AI is seeking a highly skilled and detail-oriented Systems Modeler to join our team.

The Hivemind Enterprise product is a software development kit (SDK) that enables scalable design, deployment, evaluation, and iteration of autonomy architectures for a wide range of robotic platforms. Hivemind Enterprise is a highly technical software product providing tools and user interfaces to support multiple user personae, ranging from AI developers to test engineers.

As a Systems Modeler for Hivemind at Shield AI, you will be a key member of a multidisciplinary Systems Engineering team, working collaboratively with Product, technical individual contributors, and Test / Quality Assurance team members to define, model, and communicate the structure and behavior of complex autonomy software systems. This role focuses on building and maintaining system models that span the full product stack—from foundational software and autonomy algorithms to developer infrastructure to user-facing interfaces. In addition to modeling the Hivemind SDK product, you will also use your skills to help us improve our internal engineering processes, modeling the design of the systems that support product development such as CI/CD pipelines, test and configuration systems, and software and product life cycle processes. While your primary focus will be systems modeling, as part of a full Systems Engineering team, you will also support your team members as needed by helping with functions such as requirements development.

This role is hands-on and highly collaborative, requiring deep expertise in systems modeling and Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE), strong software system intuition, and working knowledge of autonomous software pipelines. As a Systems Modeler on the Hivemind team, you will help create a shared, rigorous understanding of one of Shield AI’s most complex and critical software products. Your models will shape architecture decisions, enable cross-team alignment, and ensure that Hivemind continues to scale as a robust autonomy platform.

System modeling and MBSE: Develop and maintain high-quality system models that describe architecture, behavior, interfaces, and data flows across the Hivemind SDK. Apply MBSE principles using SysML v1 and v2, while remaining tool-agnostic and able to model effectively using Cameo, Lucid, and other general-purpose diagramming or flow-chart tools when appropriate.

Cross-stack system understanding: Work closely with engineers across the entire product stack—including foundational software, autonomy and AI algorithms, simulation and test infrastructure, and GUI layers—to capture an accurate and fully detailed model of the Hivemind SDK product.
Process and lifecycle modeling: Model internal engineering processes such as software development lifecycle workflows, CI/CD pipelines, testing and release processes, and configuration management to improve shared understanding and enable continuous improvement.

Architecture definition and analysis: Support system architecture trade studies, identify dependencies and constraints, and analyze impacts of design decisions across software components, development workflows, and operational use cases.
Requirements support: Ensure alignment and traceability between requirements and system models. Collaborate with requirements engineers and product managers to help author, review, and refine system and software requirements for the Hivemind SDK when needed.

Communication and documentation: Use system models as a primary communication artifact to align stakeholders, surface risks and gaps, and enable informed technical decision-making across teams. Produce clear, well-structured system documentation and modeling artifacts that are understandable to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Bachelor’s degree with approximately 7+ years of relevant experience, or Master’s degree with approximately 5+ years of relevant experience, in Systems Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, Robotics, Software Engineering, or a closely related technical field with demonstrated experience working on complex software or autonomous systems.

Strong experience with MBSE practices, including practical application of SysML v1.6 and familiarity with SysML v2 concepts.

Hands-on experience with Cameo Systems Modeler or equivalent MBSE tools. Ability to translate complex technical systems into clear, structured models and narratives. The ability to create effective diagrams using best practices for visual design (groupings, alignment, color, etc.) using non-MBSE-specific tools (such as Lucid, Visio, or similar diagramming software).

Proven ability to understand, model, and reason about large-scale autonomy software systems and developer-focused SDKs.

Strong understanding of modern software engineering practices, including CI/CD, automated testing, configuration management, and software lifecycle processes.

Experience working cross-functionally with software engineers, autonomy / AI engineers, test engineers, product managers, and UX / GUI teams.

Familiarity with requirements engineering concepts (e.g., requirement quality, traceability, validation) and willingness to contribute to requirements writing when needed.

Familiarity with software development workflows in modern languages (C++17 or later, Python, Go, etc.).

Prior experience modeling autonomy or robotic systems.

Experience supporting or defining developer tooling, SDKs, or platforms.

Exposure to safety-critical or mission-critical software development environments.

Experience using system models to drive reviews, design milestones, or technical decision forums.

Experience creating software tooling. For example, scripts to import information into Cameo.