Senior Software Engineer, AV Planner - Autonomous Vehicles - CA, Santa Clara, United States

Originally posted 27 August 2026 by the employer.

Develop behavior and motion planning algorithms and software for an L4 robotaxi.

About the role

As a Senior Software Engineer, AV Planner, you will develop, maintain, and integrate behavior and motion planning algorithms and software for sophisticated urban driving.

What you'll do

• Develop and ship behavior and trajectory planning for an L4 robotaxi (lane changes, merges, intersections, unprotected turns, yielding, stop-and-go, curbside operations).
• Design planning technologies and write new software modules that drive vehicles safely and comfortably in dense urban environments.
• Build optimization-, sampling-, and/or search-based planning approaches with vehicle dynamics and constraints.
• Define and implement fallback and degraded-mode behaviors and contribute to safety-oriented design.
• Integrate planning with prediction, perception, mapping/localization, and controls.
• Build and improve offline and closed-loop simulation benchmarks and metrics for planning quality.

What you'll need

• BS, MS, or higher degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, or equivalent experience.
• 12+ years of experience in the relevant field.
• Strong software engineering skills in C/C++ (production-quality, performance-aware, testable code).
• Knowledge and hands-on background in several of the following: motion planning, decision-making, optimization, search, sampling-based planning, geometry, vehicle dynamics/kinematics, real-time systems.
• Experience building and using simulation and evaluation pipelines, writing unit/integration tests, and preventing regressions via automation.
• Strong debugging skills across multi-module systems.
• Ability to communicate clearly and collaborate effectively across functions.

Nice to have

• Python experience for tooling/evaluation.
• Hands-on experience shipping urban/L4 robotaxi planning with measurable improvements in safety and ride quality.
• Experience with interaction-aware or uncertainty-aware planning (risk-sensitive decision making, robust constraints, prediction coupling).
• Experience with automotive safety concepts and analysis methods (e.g., FMEA) and building credible validation strategies.
• Track record of leading architecture/roadmap and mentoring, or rapidly delivering high-quality features with strong engineering fundamentals.
• PhD with relevant experience or significant industry experience in autonomy/robotics.

Skills: Autonomous Vehicle, AV Planner, behavior and motion planning, L4 robotaxi, real-time software, C/C++