Staff Autonomy Engineer, Perception

Kodiak Robotics, Inc. was founded in 2018 and has become a leader in autonomous ground transportation committed to a safer and more efficient future for all. The company has developed an artificial intelligence (AI) powered technology stack purpose-built for commercial trucking and the public sector. The company delivers freight daily for its customers across the southern United States using its autonomous technology. In 2024, Kodiak became the first known company to publicly announce delivering a driverless semi-truck to a customer. Kodiak is also leveraging its commercial self-driving software to develop, test and deploy autonomous capabilities for the U.S. Department of Defense.

We are seeking a Staff Autonomy Perception Engineer to join our Perception Engineering team. In this role, you will use your expertise in state estimation & multi object tracking to shape the perception stack as we scale, incorporating and developing state of the art algorithms and techniques. You’ll leverage advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) models and techniques to deploy and scale safe autonomous perception systems. If you're passionate about how robots perceive and understand the world at scale, this role is for you.

What You'll Do

• Define and lead the technical direction for learned scene estimation within the Kodiak Driver
• Architect and implement principled approaches for fusing information across multiple modalities: camera, radar, lidar, thermal, and IMU
• Lead improvements to multi-target tracking including track initiation, measurement-to-track association, and track state maintenance - with a focus on reliability in the hardest real-world conditions
• Develop novel algorithms that incorporate noisy, incomplete measurements into a robust foundational understanding of the world
• Build the tooling, metrics, and visualization infrastructure that lets the team move faster and evaluate progress rigorously
• Set a high technical standard across the Perception team through design reviews, code reviews, and mentorship
• Partner with teams across autonomy to ensure perception performance translates into system-wide safety and reliability

What You'll Bring

• BS or MS with at least 8 years of industry experience, or PhD with at least 5 years, building and deploying state estimation and sensor fusion systems
• Deep domain expertise across sensor fusion, state estimation, Kalman filtering, particle filtering, and multi-object tracking
• Strong experience with deep learning and learned scene estimation - you know when to use classical methods and when learned approaches win
• Exceptional C++ skills and a track record of writing highly maintainable, production-quality code in high-reliability systems
• The ability to define metrics, design rigorous evaluations, and use data to make principled engineering decisions
• A history of technical leadership - you have driven projects from ambiguous problem to shipped solution and raised the level of the teams around you
• Strong written and verbal communication; you write clear design docs and build alignment across disciplines

Bonus Points:

• Behavior prediction and scene understanding at scale
• Real-time perception systems under latency and compute constraints
• Autonomous vehicle or robotics deployment in unstructured environments
• Experience defining team-level technical roadmaps or leading multi-engineer efforts

What we offer:

• Competitive compensation package including equity and annual bonuses
• Excellent Medical, Dental, and Vision plans through Kaiser Permanente, Cigna, and MetLife (including a medical plan with infertility benefits)
• MetLife Legal Services, Identity & Fraud Protection, Hospital Indemnity Insurance, Accident Insurance, & Critical Illness Insurance
• Flexible PTO, 10 paid holidays, and generous parental leave policies
• Our office is centrally located in Mountain View, CA
• Office perks: dog-friendly, free catered lunch, a fully stocked kitchen, and free EV charging
• Long Term Disability, Short Term Disability, Life Insurance
• Wellbeing Benefits - Headspace through Cigna, Calm through Kaiser, One Medical, Gympass, Spring Health through Cigna, Rula (mental health navigation)
• Fidelity 401(k)
• Commuter, FSA, Dependent Care FSA, HSA
• Various incentive programs (referral bonuses, patent bonuses, etc.)

The pay range listed below reflects the base salary in our SF/Silicon Valley location, across several internal levels. Actual starting pay will be based on job-related factors including: work location, experience, relevant training, education, skill level and performance during interview. Total compensation at Kodiak includes base pay, equity, bonus and a competitive benefits package

California Pay Range$200,000-$255,000 USD At Kodiak, we strive to build a diverse community working towards our common company goals in a safe and collaborative environment where harassment of any kind is strictly prohibited. Kodiak is committed to equal opportunity employment regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability, or veteran status, or any other basis protected by applicable law. In alignment with its business operations, Kodiak adheres to all relevant statutes, regulations, and administrative prerequisites. Accordingly, roles that carry more sensitive requirements may be limited to candidates that can satisfy additional scrutiny and eligibility for such positions may hinge on verification of a candidate’s residence, U.S. person status, and/or citizenship status. Should the position require, and Kodiak determines that a candidate’s residence, U.S. person status, and/or citizenship status necessitate an export license, bar the candidate from the position, or otherwise fall under national security-related restrictions, Kodiak will consider the candidate for alternative positions unaffected by such restrictions, under terms and conditions set forth at Kodiak’s sole discretion, or, as an alternative, opt not to proceed with the candidate’s application. If applicable, Kodiak may provide visa sponsorship for eligible candidates. We use a third-party AI tool (Endorsed) to assist in the initial screening of applications. As part of the evaluation process, we provide Endorsed with job requirements and candidate-submitted applications. Final hiring decisions are made by our human recruitment team, and no automated system makes the ultimate decision regarding hiring. Certain features of the platform may qualify it as an Automated Employment Decision Tool (AEDT) under applicable regulations. We began using Endorsed on January 1, 2026. You can review the independent bias audit report covering our use of Endorsed [here](https://endorsed.com/local-law-144). By submitting your application, you acknowledge that your application may be processed by AI systems as part of the screening and selection process. If you have any questions or would like to request a separate review of your application, please contact careers@kodiak.ai with "Separate Review Request" in the email subject line.