Software Engineer, Planning & Controls - Autonomy & Robotics

DoorDash Labs is an independent team within DoorDash. We explore robotics and automation to transform last mile logistics in the long term. If you have a passion for applying robotics solutions in a service used by millions of people, then we want to talk to you!

We're hiring a Planning Controls Engineer in our Autonomy Software team. In this role, you'll own and develop flight control, motion planning, and mission planning algorithms for robust, fault-tolerant drone delivery. This is a hands-on role: you will design controllers, implement them in C++ on embedded platforms, test them in flight, and iterate.

You're excited about this opportunity because you will…

Play an integral role on a small and focused team

Develop and tune low-level flight control algorithms for overactuated multirotor and hybrid aircraft on embedded platforms

Own the dynamics simulation and aerodynamics modeling of the aircraft

Bring up and tune flight controllers on new drone platforms

Develop, tune, and test fault-tolerant control (loss of one or more motors, safe landing, emergency behaviors)

Build a trajectory motion planner for smooth flight and obstacle avoidance within the operating envelope

Help develop the high-level mission route planner with fallback locations

We're excited about you because…

You have deep controls fundamentals: linear and nonlinear systems, stability analysis, controller synthesis and tuning, frequency domain analysis, optimization, and linear algebra

You have excellent knowledge of C++ and embedded systems

You bring dynamics modeling and simulation experience with aerodynamics knowledge

You have experience developing and tuning flight controllers, interfacing with state estimation

You have excellent knowledge of motion planning algorithms (trajectory optimization and nonlinear optimization, A*/D*/RRT variants)

You have experience with sensorless brushless DC motor control

You've built or owned a robot control stack end-to-end, from design through implementation to hardware testing

MS/PhD degree in EE, ME, CS, Robotics, or related technical field

Nice to have experience includes:

Familiarity with PX4 internals (mixer, rate controller, position controller)

Experience with hybrid VTOL transition control

Experience with tethered or suspended payload dynamics

Contributions to open-source flight stacks or robotics frameworks

Published papers in controls, motion planning, or aerial robotics

Experience developing a Model Predictive Controller (MPC), including formulation, solver, and deployment

Compensation

The successful candidate’s starting pay will fall within the pay range listed below and is determined based on job-related factors including, but not limited to, skills, experience, qualifications, work location, and market conditions. Base salary is localized according to an employee’s work location. Ranges are market-dependent and may be modified in the future.

In addition to base salary, the compensation for this role includes opportunities for equity grants. Talk to your recruiter for more information.

DoorDash cares about you and your overall well-being. That’s why we offer a comprehensive benefits package to all regular employees, which includes a 401(k) plan with employer matching, 16 weeks of paid parental leave, wellness benefits, commuter benefits match, paid time off and paid sick leave in compliance with applicable laws (e.g. Colorado Healthy Families and Workplaces Act). DoorDash also offers medical, dental, and vision benefits, 11 paid holidays, disability and basic life insurance, family-forming assistance, and a mental health program, among others.

To learn more about our benefits, visit our careers page here .

See below for paid time off details:

For salaried roles: flexible paid time off/vacation, plus 80 hours of paid sick time per year.

For hourly roles: vacation accrued at about 1 hour for every 25.97 hours worked (e.g. about 6.7 hours/month if working 40 hours/week; about 3.4 hours/month if working 20 hours/week), and paid sick time accrued at 1 hour for every 30 hours worked (e.g. about 5.8 hours/month if working 40 hours/week; about 2.9 hours/month if working 20 hours/week).

The national base pay range for this position within the United States, including Illinois and Colorado.

$198,600 $292,000 USD

About DoorDash

At DoorDash, our mission to empower local economies shapes how our team members move quickly, learn, and reiterate in order to make impactful decisions that display empathy for our range of users—from Dashers to merchant partners to consumers. We are a technology and logistics company that started by enabling door-to-door delivery, and we are looking for team members who can help us go from a company that is known as the place you order food to a company that people turn to for any and all goods.

DoorDash is growing rapidly and changing constantly, which gives our team members the opportunity to share their unique perspectives, solve new c…