Senior PX4 Developer

About the role

You architect and deliver the low-level firmware and autonomy software that allows fleets of autonomous drones to operate safely and reliably in the field. You own the integration of sensor drivers, communication protocols, and flight control logic directly within the PX4 ecosystem, shaping how drones perceive and react to their environment. You translate high-level mission goals into deterministic embedded behavior across power management, peripheral orchestration, and real-time decision loops. You collaborate closely with simulation, test, and field teams to validate behaviors in HITL, SITL, and Gazero environments before aircraft flight. You contribute to a platform that scales weather modification operations by ensuring the autonomy stack is robust, observable, and performant under diverse conditions. You act as a domain expert who influences firmware roadmap decisions, tradeoffs, and long-term software architecture for the entire Rainmaker fleet. You mentor and communicate effectively with cross-functional partners to align software capabilities with operational and scientific objectives. You bring a bias for action, shipping production-grade firmware that is safe, maintainable, and observable across heterogeneous hardware platforms.

Key facts

What you'll do

Architect and maintain PX4 flight stack extensions that support custom flight behaviors, payload integration, and adaptive mission profiles.

Develop and optimize firmware for embedded resource-constrained targets such as ESP32 and RP2040, focusing on power efficiency, reliability, and deterministic execution.

Implement drivers and middleware integrations for power systems, sensors, and communication buses to ensure cohesive dataflow across the autonomy stack.

Extend and customize real-time pub/sub middleware such as Zenoh, DDS, or ROS 2 to meet latency, bandwidth, and reliability requirements for drone operations.

Modify and contribute to PX4 modules that handle communication protocols, message routing, and failover strategies in contested or degraded environments.

Analyze flight test logs, simulation data, and HITL/SITL results to diagnose software anomalies and drive targeted fixes in firmware and integration layers.

Support simulation-based testing pipelines in Gazebo, HITL, and SITL, ensuring that new firmware changes are validated before field deployment.

Collaborate with systems and test engineers to define repeatable test scenarios, regression suites, and observability metrics for autonomous flight behaviors.

Enable continuous improvement of the firmware toolchain by profiling performance, reducing resource contention, and eliminating nondeterministic behavior in critical paths.

Champion operational safety by implementing and verifying failsafes, watchdog mechanisms, and health monitoring features that protect aircraft and payloads.

Work closely with the weather operations team to align software capabilities with mission requirements, ensuring that autonomy features support scalable cloud seeding workflows.

Contribute to open source and internal documentation for interfaces, configuration options, and integration patterns used across the drone fleet.

Partner with hardware engineers to characterize peripheral performance over CAN, UART, I2C, and SPI, informing firmware designs that maximize stability and throughput.

Assess and integrate emerging middleware and messaging standards such as MAVLink, RTPS, and emerging telemetry protocols to future-proof the autonomy stack.

Requirements

Bring a minimum of 3 years of professional experience developing software for PX4 or ArduPilot systems, with a track record of contributing to flight stack modifications and firmware integrations.

Have hands-on experience shipping production code in Rust, complemented by strong capabilities in C++ or Python for systems-level development and scripting.

Demonstrate prior experience developing firmware for embedded targets such as ESP32 or RP2040, including driver implementation, bootflow, and power optimization.

Be comfortable working with low-level peripheral buses including CAN, UART, I2C, and SPI, and debugging issues that arise in mixed-signal environments.

Possess practical experience with real-time pub/sub middleware technologies such as Zenoh, DDS, ROS 2, or MQTT in resource-constrained contexts.

Show working knowledge of MAVLink protocol stacks and common autopilot integration patterns used in drone and remote vehicle systems.

Be willing to relocate to El Segundo, California, and thrive in a fast-paced, mission-driven environment where autonomy and ownership are essential.

Bring strong problem-solving skills, rigorous analytical thinking, and the ability to translate ambiguous operational requirements into concrete firmware solutions.

Nice to have

Experience with simulation frameworks such as Gazebo, HITL, and SITL workflows, and a history of improving test coverage for firmware changes.

Familiarity with cloud seeding workflows, atmospheric sensing, or environmental monitoring systems that influence flight planning and autonomy decisions.

Background in safety-critical systems, DO-178C or equivalent processes, and a mindset for rigorous failure mode analysis and mitigation.

Knowledge of continuous integration and automated testing pipelines tailored to embedded aviation software, including build, flash, and regression test frameworks.

Experience with telemetry dashboards, log analysis tools, and observability platforms that help surface anomalies in autonomous flight operations.

Practical notes

Full-time onsite role based in El Segundo, California.

Candidates must be willing to relocate to El Segundo, California.

E-Verify participation is required for this position.