Nuvia
General Summary:
Hiring in Santa Clara & San Diego locations.
Role Overview:
We are seeking a Director of Engineering to lead the end-to-end engineering strategy and execution for Drone solutions within the IE-IoT business unit. This role will drive innovation across hardware, software, and AI systems, ensuring Qualcomm’s leadership in next-generation drone platforms for industrial, commercial, and emerging markets.
Key Responsibilities:
Strategic Leadership:
Define and execute the engineering roadmap for drones, aligning with IE-IoT’s long-term vision and Qualcomm’s growth objectives.
Partner with product management and business teams to translate market opportunities into technical deliverables.
Technology Development:
Oversee architecture and development of drone compute platforms, including heterogeneous SoCs, AI accelerators, and multi-OS environments (Linux, ROS2, Android).
Drive advancements in visual-inertial odometry (VIO), GPS-denied navigation, BVLOS capabilities, and autonomy stacks.
Integrate cutting-edge AI solutions for perception, planning, and anomaly detection leveraging Qualcomm’s AI Hub and SDKs.
Cross-Functional Collaboration:
Work closely with robotics and connectivity teams to deliver high-performance, low-power solutions for drones.
Collaborate with ecosystem partners and standards bodies to ensure compliance and interoperability.
Operational Excellence:
Build and mentor a world-class engineering team across multiple geographies.
Establish best practices for design, validation, and certification, including functional safety and regulatory compliance.
Impact:
This role is pivotal in shaping Qualcomm’s position in the drones-as-a-service market and enabling AI-driven autonomy for industrial and commercial applications. You will lead initiatives that integrate long-range connectivity, AI perception models, and multi-camera systems, delivering best-in-class performance and power efficiency.
Minimum Qualifications:
• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Information Systems, Computer Science, or related field and 8+ years of Systems Engineering or related work experience.Preferred Qualifications:
12+ years of experience in embedded systems, robotics, or drone engineering, with at least 5 years in leadership roles.
Proven track record in system architecture, AI/ML integration, and real-time control systems.
Deep knowledge of connectivity technologies (5G, Wi-Fi, GNSS) and edge AI frameworks.
Deep knowledge of integrated chipset solutions for private connectivity, MNO connectivity, Wi-Fi offload, camera image processor and AI processors.
Strong understanding of ROS2, Linux, and heterogeneous compute platforms.
Excellent leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills.
Experience in commercial drone product development and BVLOS certification.
DO-178C certification experience for airborne software compliance.
DO-254 certification experience for airborne electronic hardware compliance.
Principal Duties and Responsibilities:
• Leverages expert Systems knowledge and experience to implement and drive the research, design, development, simulation, and/or validation of systems-level software, hardware, architecture, algorithms, and solutions while ensuring system-level requirements and standards are met.
• Directs and influences the functional analysis that drives requirements and specifications and defines and aligns with standards for hardware and software.
• Leads multiple teams in the analysis and development of system level design including requirements, interface definition, functional/performance definition, and implementation of a new system or modification of an existing system.
• Collaborates with high-level representatives from other functions (e.g., testing group, product group, customers) to develop and execute system design.
• Sets the strategic direction for the discipline and communicates across the organization; translates strategy into a strong execution plan.
• Directs and implements standards for the triage of problems at the system level; presents results of testing and debugging to internal and external stakeholders.
Level of Responsibility:
• Provides supervision to other supervisors/managers who are direct reports.
• Decision-making is critical in nature and impacts program, product, or project success.
• Requires verbal and written communication skills to convey highly complex and/or detailed information. May require strong negotiation and influence with large groups or high-level constituents.
• Develops and administers budgets, schedules, and performance standards for functional area within the prescribed budgetary objectives of the department.
• Has a great degree of influence over key organizational decisions (e.g., is making or directly making key decisions that will have substantial impact over the organization).
• Tasks often require multiple steps which can be performed in various orders; extensive planning, problem-solving, and prioritization must occur to complete the tasks effectively.
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Pay range and Other Compensation & Benefits:
$248,100.00 - $372,100.00The above pay scale reflects the broad, minimum to maximum, pay scale for this job code for the location for which it has been posted. Even more importantly, please note that salary is only one component of total compensation at Qualcomm. We also offer a competitive annual discretionary bonus program and opportunity for annual RSU grants (employees on sales-incentive plans are not eligible for our annual bonus). In addition, our highly competitive benefits package is designed to support your success at work, at home, and at play. Your recruiter will be happy to discuss all that Qualcomm has to offer – and you can review more details about our US benefits at this link.
If you would like more information about this role, please contact Qualcomm Careers.