At Skyways, we are building the future of air transportation with fully autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Backed by significant funding, including a $37M STRATFI contract from the U.S. Air Force, we operate at the intersection of commercial and defense markets. We have designed, built, and flown aircraft with real customers and government partners, and are now entering the next phase of the company: scaling toward production.
Based in Austin, TX and supported by top investors including Y Combinator, Skyways blends rapid iteration with real world deployment. We design, test, and operate our systems in the field, then bring those learnings directly back into engineering and product decisions. As we grow, we are looking for builders and leaders who want real ownership, technical depth, and the opportunity to help take an aircraft from successful deployments to full production.
The Opportunity
Skyways is looking for a Computer Vision and Robotics Intern to work on perception and autonomy systems that support our Detect and Avoid (DAA) capabilities.
You will work closely with our autonomy and robotics engineers to develop and test machine learning models that help aircraft detect and track other aircraft in real-world environments. This role provides hands-on experience working with robotics software, computer vision models, and simulated or generated datasets used to evaluate state-of-the-art algorithms.
Interns at Skyways work on real problems that impact active aircraft programs. Your work will directly support the development and validation of perception systems used in autonomous flight.
What You'll Do:
Develop and test computer vision models for detecting and tracking aircraft.
Support Detect and Avoid (DAA) perception developmentGenerate and analyze datasets used for training and evaluation.
Integrate models into robotics software pipelines using ROS 2.
Evaluate performance of perception algorithms using simulation and generated data.
Collaborate with autonomy engineers to improve system performance and reliability.
What You'll Learn:
Machine learning applied to real robotic systems.
Integration of ML models with ROS-based robotics software.
Dataset generation and evaluation workflows for perception systems.
Testing and benchmarking state-of-the-art computer vision models.
How autonomy software transitions from research to deployed aircraft systems.
What You'll Bring:
Currently pursuing a M.S. or Ph.D. in Computer Science, Robotics, Electrical Engineering, or a related field.
Experience with Python and machine learning frameworks such as PyTorch or TensorFlow.
Familiarity with computer vision, perception, or object detection models.
Interest in robotics, autonomy, or autonomous vehicles.
Ability to work collaboratively in a fast-moving engineering environment.
Want to join our mission? Apply to learn more!
Due to U.S. government contract requirements, this role is limited to U.S. citizens, U.S. permanent residents, or candidates from specific countries authorized under applicable export control regulations.
Skyways is an Equal Opportunity employer committed to diversity in the workplace. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, age, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, protected veteran status or any other factor protected by applicable local, state or federal laws.
