Director of Autonomy (Robotics & Maritime Systems)

About the role

The Director of Autonomy will shape the technical vision and execution of HavocAI’s autonomous systems for complex maritime environments. This senior leadership position requires deep expertise in robotics, perception, planning, and control, and the ability to translate concepts into deployed mission capabilities.

Key responsibilities

• Define autonomy architecture, interfaces, standards, and integration strategies across perception, planning, controls, and vehicle‑level decision‑making.
• Lead technical trade‑offs balancing performance, safety, reliability, latency, compute constraints, scalability, and mission needs.
• Guide development of motion planning, path planning, behavior planning, control, and multi‑vessel coordination algorithms.
• Ensure autonomy solutions are robust for real‑world maritime operations, handling uncertain environments, degraded sensors, and dynamic contacts.
• Collaborate with engineering, product, hardware, mission software, and field operations teams to deliver reliable autonomous capabilities.
• Mentor senior engineers and drive technical alignment across autonomy, perception, embedded systems, and field operations.

Required profile

• Senior technical leader with extensive experience in robotics and fielded autonomous systems.
• Proven ability to lead and scale engineering teams, set architecture direction, and mentor senior staff.
• Strong understanding of maritime operational constraints and real‑time system integration.

Required skills

• Robotics
• Perception
• Motion planning
• Control systems
• Multi‑agent coordination
• Simulation
• Testing
• Deployment of autonomous systems