Tera AI · 4 months ago
Founding Robotics Engineer — Autonomy (Planning & Control) + 3D Vision
San Francisco Bay Area
Full-time
Onsite
Mid Level
3+ years expTera AI is a stealth, VC-backed startup focused on building a new class of spatial AI for autonomy solutions. The Founding Robotics Engineer will be responsible for delivering full-stack autonomous systems, leading autonomy, planning, and control tasks, while implementing 3D vision methods.
Artificial Intelligence (AI)RoboticsSoftware
Responsibilities
Deliver full-stack autonomous systems
Own autonomy stack: global + local planning, behavior state machines, and low-level control (PID/MPC). Human occupied area identification and avoidance
Integrate with 3D vision: fuse VO/SLAM/BA outputs (pose graphs, depth, point clouds) into mapping + planning layers; close the loop on navigation and task execution
Ship on edge: optimize for Jetson Orin NX/AGX (TensorRT/CUDA), budget CPU/GPU/latency, and implement watchdogs/fail-safes
Productize the loop: minimal operator UI + telemetry for missions, logs/metrics, fleet-safe OTA
Benchmark & iterate: define datasets, metrics, and eval harnesses; run ablations; raise reliability
Qualification
Required
Autonomy / Planning / Control (primary need)
Motion planning (graph-based and/or optimization-based), dynamic obstacle handling, recovery behaviors
Controllers (PID/MPC), tracking, and tuning in the real world
Behavior orchestration (behavior trees, HFSMs) and safety interlocks
3D Vision integration
Working with SLAM/VO/BA outputs, pose graphs, and map representations (ESDF/TSDF/occupancy)
Depth perception & point-cloud alignment; fine-tuning models when needed
Edge robotics
Deploying on Jetson Orin NX/AGX or similar; real-time performance, profiling, and optimization
Strong software fundamentals
Python (5+ years) and modern C++ familiarity for performance-critical paths
Production-grade code, testing, and diagnostics; excellent Git hygiene and PR workflows
Product sensibility: You've defined, built, and launched robotic or vision-heavy products (e.g., autonomous systems, drones, AMRs, self-driving modules, simulation-heavy apps)
3+ years building and shipping autonomy/planning/control in robots, drones, or AV/AMR systems
2+ years integrating perception (SLAM/VO/BA) with navigation/planning on real robots
Preferred
CUDA/TensorRT, PyTorch; OpenCV; GTSAM/Ceres; ROS 2 (Nav2, rclcpp/rclpy), PX4/MAVLink
Mapping: loop-closure, multi-session mapping, map scale recovery; calibration/VI-calib
Perception models for QR/marker/object counting; tracking + data association
Embedded application work; ruggedized systems; hardware bring-up with sensors (IMU, mono/RGB, ToF/LiDAR optional)
Lightweight backend for ops: telemetry, logging (rosbag, OpenTelemetry), WebRTC/RTSP streaming; simple operator UI
DevOps for on-prem/edge: containers, GPU scheduling, OTA, observability (DataDog/Sentry/CloudWatch helpful but not required)
Security for data at rest/in motion; SOC2/GDPR familiarity (nice, not a blocker)
Spatial data/GIS (PostGIS) a plus
UAV/ground robotics experience and safe-ops procedures
Company
Tera AI
Tera AI is creating a software-only, platform-agnostic spatial reasoning AI that will allow any robot to use its camera to navigate.
2-10 employees
H1B Sponsorship
Tera AI has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships. Please note that this does not
guarantee sponsorship for this specific role. Below presents additional info for your
reference. (Data Powered by US Department of Labor)
Distribution of Different Job Fields Receiving Sponsorship
Represents job field similar to this job
Trends of Total Sponsorships
2023 (3)
Funding
Current Stage
Early StageTotal Funding
$8M2025-03-19Seed· $8M
Company data provided by crunchbase