(Senior) Autonomous Driving Engineer (gn) @ Stealth Autonomous Vehicle Venture, Valencia

This is a FoodLabs  portfolio venture. Find out more about us and other opportunities in the portfolio here.

About the venture 

One of our portfolio companies, currently operating in stealth mode, is building a founding team with a Skunk Works mentality—small-sized team where every individual is highly skilled and internally driven. They are looking for an autonomous driving engineer, mechanical engineer, technician, and office manager to join them full-time, on-site in Valencia, Spain.

As the autonomous driving engineer, you'll work side by side with the founders, shaping the product from customer insights to prototypes, manufacturing, and beyond. This role is for someone who thrives on solving hard problems, works best with autonomy, and sees opportunity where others see obstacles.

The company was founded by two engineers with unconventional track records: one developed electrified drones and hydrogen-powered supersonic planes, while the other worked on quantum machine learning at BMW and Google X. Their mission is to transform agriculture—a field long neglected by innovation.

They've reimagined the tractor from the ground up, cutting 70% of its components and creating space for a massive battery pack, on-board servers, and satellite connectivity. The result is a platform that isn't just a tractor but will become a central hub for IoT devices in remote areas. The modular design of the vehicles allows different configurations, enabling additional use cases in mining and front-line logistics, drastically reducing the need for human personnel in dangerous environments.

What you'll work on 

The vehicle’s control architecture is built around two integrated systems:

• A core system for low-level control including actuation and safety-critical tasks.
• An autonomous system for high-level decision-making such as path planning and obstacle avoidance.

We’re looking for someone ready to lead development on the autonomous system while being eager to learn from the team and external partners about the intricacies of the core system. Specifically, your work will include:

• Design, develop, and implement the autonomous system:
  • Platform (CPU/GPU) running ROS2.
  • Sensory array and sensor fusion.
  • Interface between the autonomous and core systems.
  • End-to-end pipeline for data pre-processing, cleaning, and labelling.
  • ML Models for autonomous navigation.
    
    
• Design, develop, and implement the core system (can be learned on the job):
  • Platform (VCU/PLC) programmed with e.g. CodeSys to adhere to safety standards.
  • I/O system for RC input, linear actuators, electric motors, and peripherals.
  • Remote control terminal and data interface for tele-operations.
  • Infrastructure for remote software updates.
    
    
• Testing and deployment:
  • Conduct bench testing to ensure reliability, performance, and safety.
  • Participate in field testing, both to ensure software quality and customer satisfaction.