Staff Software Engineer

Company Overview
ACS (Allen Control Systems) is a defense technology company building precision robotic systems for the United States and its allies. Founded by two former U.S. Navy electrical engineers with deep experience in robotics and software ACS brings together AI computer vision precision motion and advanced hardware to solve complex defense challenges across land air and maritime environments.

Our flagship product Bullfrog is an autonomous precision weapon system that transforms existing weapons into highly accurate counter-drone systems giving warfighters a scalable cost-effective response to one of the fastest-growing threats on the modern battlefield. Bullfrog is deployed with U.S. forces and ACS works with organizations throughout the U.S. military and national security community.

Following a $200 million Series B at a $2.2 billion valuation ACS is rapidly expanding manufacturing accelerating Bullfrog deployments and developing the next generation of autonomous battlefield systems. This is an opportunity to join a proven fast-moving team and help scale technology with direct real-world impact on national security.

ACS is headquartered in Austin Texas with additional operations in Alexandria Virginia; Mountain View California; and Huntsville Alabama. For more information visit .

Position Overview:

We are seeking a highly skilled Staff Software Engineer to join our team in Austin. TX or Mountain View this role you will serve as a senior individual contributor providing technical leadership across software architecture system design and execution for advanced robotics and autonomous systems. This is a hands-on engineering role in which you will design implement test debug and optimize critical software components using C and Python while also guiding broader technical direction.

What Youll Do:

• Own complex technical initiatives from initial concept and architecture through implementation integration validation and production deployment.

• Contribute directly to the codebase particularly in technically challenging or high-risk areas and ensure that solutions align with product safety scalability reliability and long-term maintainability goals.

• Define and evolve software architecture establish engineering standards and lead the design of systems that integrate software mechanical electrical perception controls and autonomy components.

• Work through technical influence and cross-functional collaboration rather than formal people management.

• Partner with engineering managers product leaders and multidisciplinary teams to shape technical roadmaps identify and mitigate high-impact risks improve system performance and deliver robust software for demanding production and mission-critical environments.

What Youll Need:

• 10 years of professional Software Engineering experience with recent experience in a Senior/Staff level position

• Bachelors or Masters degree in Computer Science Software Engineering Robotics Electrical Engineering or a related technical field; an advanced degree is preferred.

• Significant experience developing complex software systems in C and Python ideally within robotics autonomous systems embedded systems or other high-performance engineering environments.

• A demonstrated track record as a senior individual contributor who has personally designed implemented and delivered complex or business-critical software systems while influencing technical direction across multiple teams.

• Demonstrated ability to lead software architecture and system-level technical decision-making across multidisciplinary teams including mechanical electrical computer vision controls and software engineering.

• Deep experience with performance optimization multithreading concurrency memory management system programming debugging and software reliability in production or mission-critical environments.

• Strong understanding of software engineering best practices including design patterns code reviews unit and integration testing technical documentation Git-based workflows CI/CD pipelines and agile development practices.

• Proven ability to influence technical direction without relying on formal authority resolve complex engineering tradeoffs and drive alignment across teams in a fast-paced product development environment.

• Strong problem-solving communication and technical judgment skills with the ability to balance strategic technical leadership with substantial hands-on engineering contributions.

Youll Stand Out:

• Experience architecting and directly implementing software for robotics autonomy perception navigation controls or real-time systems.

• Experience with GPU programming CUDA OpenCL parallel computing or hardware-accelerated software optimization.

• Knowledge of networking protocols distributed systems edge computing embedded Linux or real-time operating systems.

• Exposure to machine learning frameworks such as TensorFlow or PyTorch computer vision pipelines sensor fusion or scientific computing.

• Experience establishing engineering standards technical roadmaps design review processes or software governance practices across growing engineering organizations.

• A track record of leading large technically complex initiatives across multiple teams while remaining directly involved in architecture coding debugging integration and delivery.

What We Offer:

• Competitive salary

• ACS Equity Package

• Health Dental Vision Insurance

• Paid Time Off

Allen Control Systems is an Equal Opportunity Employer providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment. Allen Control Systems prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race color religion age sex national origin disability status genetics protected veteran status sexual orientation gender identity or expression or any other characteristic protected by federal state or local laws.

#LI-AS1

Required Experience:

Staff IC