[Remote] Senior Software Engineer - Rust

Note: The job is a remote job and is open to candidates in USA. Defense Unicorns is a company focused on delivering mission value through streamlined software delivery for national security missions. They are seeking a mission-driven Rust Software Engineer to design and implement resilient software systems that enable human-machine-AI teaming and autonomous capabilities for military operators. The role involves contributing across the full system lifecycle, from architecture to deployment, while collaborating with engineers and researchers.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement high-performance, distributed, software systems in Rust, targeting cloud-native as well as resource-constrained and edge computing environments
• Participate in system architecture, network topologies, hardware part evaluation, and engineering reviews for both existing product revisions and new systems
• Develop software/models systems that supports human-in-the-loop and human-on-the-loop autonomy workflows for distributed operations
• Build infrastructure enabling deterministic builds, reproducible environments, and configuration management to ensure traceability and maintainability
• Implement and maintain systems with over-the-air (OTA) update mechanisms for field-deployed systems - virtual machines, containers, and embedded packages
• Integrate software with microcontroller peripherals and hardware buses (SPI, I2C, UART, Ethernet, USB, AXI, etc.)
• Develop and execute comprehensive experiment and test strategies including:
• Unit testing
• Software-in-the-Loop (SITL)
• Hardware-in-the-Loop (HITL)
• Functional, end-to-end system/field/scale testing
• Collaborate with mission heroes and multidisciplinary teams to deploy and sustain systems, supporting integration and various exercises and operational events
• Optimize systems for performance, reliability, power consumption, and maintainability

Skills

• Professional experience in software engineering, embedded systems, or firmware development - delivering production-grade product
• Strong proficiency in Rust - experience in low-level, embedded or no_std environments a bonus
• Experience integrating with microcontroller peripherals and hardware interfaces (SPI, I2C, UART, Ethernet, USB, etc.)
• Familiarity with software design, algorithm implementation, debugging/testing/profiling, and performance optimization
• Working knowledge of: Distributed systems, data-distribution and network architectures
• Working knowledge of: Networking protocols and technologies (TCP/UDP, BLE/LoRa, routing)
• Working knowledge of: Trust systems, certificate management, and encryption schemes
• Working knowledge of: Modern data patterns, CRDTs, offline-first, synchronization/replication
• Strong communication skills and ability to collaborate across engineering disciplines
• U.S. citizenship and ability to obtain and maintain a Top Secret / SCI security clearance
• Experience developing autonomy, robotics, or human-machine-AI teaming systems
• Experience applying machine learning techniques, including supervised/unsupervised learning, clustering, and classification
• Experience with software-defined radio, MANET, and industrial/robotics communications systems
• Experience optimizing systems for speed, size, power consumption, and cost
• Experience contributing to open-source projects or industry standards bodies
• Experience deploying systems in contested or disconnected edge environments

Benefits

• Medical/Dental/Vision
• Premiums are 100% Company Paid
• Health Savings Account
• Life Insurance
• Disability Insurance
• 401k Retirement Plan
• Company Stock Options
• Home Office Budget
• We offer all full-time Unicorns Flexible Time Off (FTO) plus all Federal Holidays, one week for Thanksgiving, and two weeks for Christmas and New Years
• Paid Parental Leave
• Reimbursement for approved trainings/subscriptions
• Conferences (travel, lodging, and fees)

Company Overview