C
USD 140000–240000/yr

Staff Software Engineer, Technical Lead

United States - San Francisco · San_franciscoFull Timelead
Software EngineerSoftware EngineeringSoftware Engineer, Technical Lead
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Quick Summary

Overview

Chef Robotics is accelerating the deployment of intelligent machines in the physical world, starting with food production—a sector facing the largest labor shortage in the U.S., with 1.

Technical Tools
Software EngineerSoftware EngineeringSoftware Engineer, Technical Lead
Chef Robotics is accelerating the deployment of intelligent machines in the physical world, starting with food production—a sector facing the largest labor shortage in the U.S., with 1.14M unfilled jobs today and 3.1M projected by 2030. These roles cannot be offshored, making robotics essential to keeping production onshore and strengthening America’s manufacturing base. Backed by investors like Kleiner Perkins, Construct, Bloomberg Beta, and Promus Ventures, and supported by a world-class team from companies such as Cruise, Zoox, Google, Tesla, and Amazon Robotics, Chef is rapidly scaling with multiple multi-year contracts and a mission to put an intelligent robot in every commercial kitchen.



About the Role

We’re seeking a Staff Software Engineer to provide hands-on technical leadership for the core software platform that powers our production robotic systems. This role owns the on-robot software stack end to end, from Linux-based platform software and robotics middleware through fleet management, deployment, and cloud connectivity.

You'll work across software and data engineering, partnering closely with Autonomy, Hardware, Product, and Field Operations to deliver production-ready robotic systems for Tier 1 food production customers.
  • Define and evolve the architecture for on-robot software, including OS configuration, hardware abstraction, middleware, and system services
  • Lead middleware architecture decisions for real-time robot control, sensor integration, and inter-process communication
  • Establish patterns for full-stack development, connecting on-robot systems to cloud services and web interfaces
  • Write production code for high-impact features across the stack: robotics middleware, backend services, and cloud infrastructure
  • Lead critical technical initiatives, including robotic platform software, cloud data pipelines, and fleet management platform
  • Build robust deployment, monitoring, and OTA update systems for production robot fleets
  • Debug the most challenging issues from kernel/driver level through the application layer
  • Establish engineering standards and processes that balance rigor with startup agility
  • Champion reliability, observability, and testing practices across embedded and cloud systems
  • Mentor engineers through code reviews, design discussions, and pairing sessions
  • Collaborate with Hardware and Autonomy teams on system integration and performance optimization
  • Build and maintain internal and developer tooling that acts as a force multiplier across the organization
  • 8+ years of software engineering with 3+ years in technical leadership roles
  • Track record delivering production robotic systems, IoT devices, or autonomous systems at scale
  • Experience designing reliable systems for B2B/enterprise deployments
  • On-device platform expertise: OS configuration, device drivers, system services, networking stack configuration
  • Robotics middleware: ROS/ROS2, real-time systems, sensor integration
  • Infrastructure: Containerization (Docker/K8s), CI/CD pipelines, monitoring/observability
  • Collaborative robots (Universal Robots UR5E or similar cobots)
  • Over-the-air update systems and remote device management at scale
  • Background in manufacturing/production environments
  • Track record at high-growth hardware/robotics startups
  • Cloud experience: AWS/GCP/Azure
  • Full-stack development: Backend services (Python/C++), APIs, database design, web interfaces
  • Listing Details

    Posted
    January 20, 2026
    First seen
    March 26, 2026
    Last seen
    April 24, 2026

    Posting Health

    Days active
    28
    Repost count
    0
    Trust Level
    34%
    Scored at
    April 24, 2026

    Signal breakdown

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    C
    Staff Software Engineer, Technical LeadUSD 140000–240000