At Orca AI Defense we build autonomous and AI-driven maritime systems for defense and government operators - perception, navigation and decision-making that run onboard, in real time, at sea, under conditions nobody controls.
We are hiring a Senior Robotics Algorithm Engineer to own the algorithmic core of our unmanned surface vessel: everything between a world state and a safe navigation command. Localization, route and path generation, continuous replanning, encounter reasoning, collision avoidance, COLREG-aware behavior and the decision logic that ties them together are yours. The maritime environment is unforgiving and only partly observable. Other vessels do not declare their intent, tracks are noisy, the sea moves under you, and the rules of the road are written for humans exercising judgment.
You will own the algorithmic core end to end. From the moment a world model arrives to the moment the vessel commits to a maneuver, every navigation decision the system makes is one you designed.
What Will You Do?
Own the algorithmic path from world state to safe navigation commands, end to end
Design and implement global and local planning: route generation, waypoint generation, path following, and continuous replanning as conditions change
Build collision avoidance for dynamic maritime environments: encounter detection and classification, reasoning about other vessels' course, speed, intent and uncertainty, maneuver selection and timing, and return-to-route logic
Design mission-level decision logic: continue, deviate, hold, abort, transition to safe state and define the behavior envelope
Build the data pipeline and own performance in simulation and at sea
Requirements
5+ years in robotics algorithms: motion planning, decision making or collision avoidance for autonomous platforms
Automotive planning and behavior background
Strong practical command of planning methods and their real-time trade-offs
Demonstrated work on decision making under uncertainty with dynamic obstacles
Production-grade C++ and Python; able to write algorithms that run reliably in real time on embedded compute
Experience taking an algorithm from concept through field trials and making it behave correctly in the real world
Nice-To-Haves
Maritime domain knowledge: COLREGs, AIS and radar tracking, navigation practice
Multi-agent interaction, intent estimation, or reactive and game-theoretic planning
MPC, trajectory optimization, or reachability and safety-envelope methods
Experience in defense programs
Challenges & Opportunities
Own the algorithmic core of an autonomous vessel
Solve decision making in an environment where intent is unknown
Watch your algorithms control a real vessel at sea immediately
Shape how an entire product line navigates, from the first platform onward
Join a small, high-impact team working at the bleeding edge of autonomy and robotics
