Senior Software Engineer (Motion Planning Metrics)

Oxa is enabling the transition to self-driving vehicles through an initial focus on the most commercially advanced sector; the autonomous shuttling of goods and people.

We are home to some of the world’s leading experts on autonomous vehicles, creating solutions such as Oxa Driver, equipping vehicles with full self-driving functionality; Oxa MetaDriver, using Generative AI to accelerate and assure the safety of deployments; and Oxa Hub, a set of cloud-based offerings for autonomous fleet management. Our technology is being deployed across the UK and the U.S, and we’re partnering with a fast-growing ecosystem of operators, vehicle OEMs and equipment makers serving autonomous transportation globally as it advances.

Based in Oxford, and with offices in Canada and the U.S, Oxa was founded in 2014 and is  growing rapidly (350+ ‘Oxbots’ to date). Our purpose is to change the way the Earth moves, through an uncompromising focus on safety, efficiency and explainability of our AI approaches. The company has attracted $225 million from leading investors so far, with $140 million raised in the last Series C funding round in January 2023.

The role

We are seeking a highly skilled and experienced C++ Software Engineer with expertise in developing robust mechanisms and pipelines which acquire metrics for real-time production autonomy software and evaluate its performance. You will be responsible for developing tools and workflows that generate autonomy performance metrics when operating our Oxa Driver stack, and building instrumentation to monitor and assess on-road decision making. You will champion the utilisation of these instruments through documentation, training, co-development and support, thereby ensuring their optimal reliability and scalability. Moreover, you will play a key role in defining the verification and validation strategies and mechanisms for the Oxa Driver Motion Planner.

As a member of the Evaluators, Metrics and Tooling platform team, you will work closely with core robotics engineers to better measure Motion Planning performance. You will be accountable for assessing, helping identify and reporting on the Motion Planner’s end-to-end deliverables for both internal and external stakeholders. As part of the larger Manoeuvres Stream, your platform will rely on your field expertise and knowledge of mobile Motion Planning systems to regularly collaborate with a variety of capability owners to innovate and drive progress. 

As a Senior Software Engineer in the Evaluators, Metrics and Tooling platform team, you will assess Motion Planning performance by:

• Developing and maintaining high quality processes and APIs to generate performance signals and combine them to create meaningful performance metrics
• Building and owning the necessary tools and the Planning evaluation framework
• Contributing significantly to the engineering lifecycle, including scoping, design, implementation, testing, deployment and maintenance of your team’s work
• Verifying and validating through on-road testing and scenario simulation
• Leveraging synthetic data from simulations to expand test situations
• Managing CI / CD pipelines to monitor performance regressions
• Collaboratively defining processes and new metrics with other teams
• Influencing and assisting with technical strategy, training and hiring ensuring alignment with the Stream’s overall objectives
• Interfacing with other teams to refine your knowledge of the autonomy stack and gain exposure to all aspects of the business

Requirements

What you need to succeed:

• Degree in Robotics or a related field (e.g., Computer Science, Engineering, Physics, etc.)
• Solid foundational knowledge of Robotics technologies and how they operate
• Extensive experience designing, developing and maintaining pipelines and tools to measure real-time engineering operations and processes
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills in performing statistical analysis, data modeling, and predictive analytics.
• Professional experience in modern C++, including the STL and common testing frameworks
• Fluency in Python for software development
• Ability to develop high-quality APIs and code documentation
• Deep understanding of software development methodologies, code reviews, version control systems (e.g., Git), and agile practices
• Demonstrated leadership skills in collaborating cross-functionally and providing guidance to junior members
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, especially in articulating complex technical concepts across company stakeholders

Extra kudos if you have:

• Prior experience in verification and validation of on-road Motion Planning systems
• Understanding of decision making, trajectory generation and control algorithms
• Exposure to automotive testing and simulation frameworks (e.g. Applied Intuition, Carla, etc.)
• Experience with databases (e.g., SQL)
• Certification in cloud computing (e.g., GCP, AWS, Azure, etc.)
• Ability to develop dashboard UIs for publishing performance (e.g., Grafana, Apache Superset, etc.)
• Exposure to safety certification standards and processes

Benefits

We provide:

• Competitive salary, benchmarked against the market and reviewed annually
• Company share programme
• Hybrid and/or flexible work arrangements
• An outstanding flexible benefits fund including private medical insurance, critical illness coverage, life assurance, EAP, group income protection
• Funded relocation support
• Fully funded Visa sponsorship if required
• A salary exchange pension plan
• 25 days’ annual leave plus bank holidays
• A pet-friendly office environment
• Safe assigned spaces for team members with individual and diverse needs

Our Culture:

We promote an open and inclusive culture that empowers our Oxbots to bring their whole, authentic selves to work every day. Oxa is proud to be an inclusive organisation and, as such, we require all team members within our recruitment process to understand and deploy best practices focused on de-biasing the whole recruitment cycle.We also apply a neuro inclusive lens to our recruitment process and want each potential Oxbot to enjoy the best experience possible for them. Please share with us any individual needs or reasonable adjustments we may need to make in advance of commencing the interview process with us.

Learn more about our culture here.

Why become an Oxbot?

Our team of experts in computer science, AI, robotics and machine learning is world-class, and together they’re solving the most exciting and important technological challenges of our times.

But as well as smarts, Oxbots have heart. Our diverse, multi-cultural crew is guided by a shared vision to bring the myriad benefits of autonomy to our customers and partners. And in a company that celebrates uniqueness as much as skill and experience, they do it with energy, conviction and a healthy dose of excitement, too.

If you are bold, creative and hyper skilled, come and create the future of autonomy with us at Oxa.