Senior Engineer, System Integration Test (R6086)

About the role

Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company developing mission autonomy software, aircraft and simulation technologies. As a System Integration Test Engineer, you will integrate and verify Hivemind mission autonomy software on Autonomous Collaborative Platform (ACP) flight hardware, acting as the technical bridge between autonomy algorithms and aircraft systems. You will work with Shield AI and aircraft platform vendors to verify interfaces, validate edge compute performance and resolve integration issues before flight testing.

Key responsibilities

• Deploy, integrate and verify Hivemind mission autonomy software with ACP software and hardware in Shield AI and vendor SIL and HIL labs.
• Develop integration test plans, test cards, schedules and success criteria across lab, ground and flight test phases.
• Identify architectural, interface, protocol, timing and hardware/software gaps early, and define gap-closure plans, risk mitigations and workarounds with engineering and partners.
• Coordinate with aircraft OEMs and vendors on lab readiness, entry/exit criteria and joint integration campaigns.
• Run integration tests, configure test benches and troubleshoot multi-system anomalies in real time.
• Help design test automation and simulation scripts, and enforce test entry/exit criteria to gate delivery to ground and flight test.
• Support travel to test sites, customer events and integration activities.

Required profile

• Typically 5+ years of relevant experience with a bachelor's degree in aerospace, electrical, computer, mechanical or systems engineering, or 3+ years with a master's degree.
• Demonstrated system integration and test experience, including SIL, HIL, simulation and flight test environments.
• Ability to write integration test plans, procedures and test cards, and turn results into engineering findings and gap-closure roadmaps.
• Strong troubleshooting of complex interfaces using telemetry, logs, packet capture tools (e.g. Wireshark) or hardware diagnostics.
• Willingness to travel periodically to vendor facilities and flight test locations.
• U.S. citizenship and ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. DoD SECRET clearance; active SECRET or TOP SECRET clearance preferred.

Required skills

• Linux and scripting (Python preferred) for test automation, data analysis and bench interfacing.
• Preferred: experience with ACP, CCA, UAS (Group 4/5) or military mission systems.
• Preferred: experience in aircraft OEM or defense prime contractor integration labs.
• Preferred: familiarity with OMS, UCI and MOSA, and middleware such as DDS, ROS/ROS2, ZeroMQ, gRPC.
• Preferred: understanding of airworthiness, safety-of-flight and software assurance standards (DO-178C, DO-254, MIL-STD-882E).