Principal Drone Engineer

Drone Principal (L7 equivalent), org-wide scope 12+ years

Other levels: Senior Drone Engineer Lead Drone Engineer Junior Drone Engineer

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Anduril

Skydio

Shield AI

Zipline

DJI

AeroVironment

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The job description

Tech stack. UAS platform strategy, advanced flight dynamics, autonomy architecture, certification strategy, technical roadmapping, cross-functional leadership, systems thinking

About the role

You will join a drone technology company as its principal technical authority on unmanned aircraft: the engineer who sets the multi-year technical direction for the fleet. You operate across programs and teams, defining platform strategy, resolving the hardest technical disputes, and growing the next generation of technical leaders. Your influence shows up in every aircraft the company ships, whether or not you touched the design directly, and your standards define what good engineering looks like here. You will lead technical due diligence on acquisition targets and major partnerships, assessing whether outside technology genuinely fits the company's platform strategy, and you will report your findings directly to executive leadership.

What you will achieve

Define the multi-year UAS technology roadmap, aligning platform architecture, autonomy investments, and manufacturing strategy with business goals.
Set company-wide engineering standards for design, test, safety, and documentation that measurably raise quality across every program.
Resolve organization-level technical disputes and architecture decisions with analysis that teams trust, adopt, and defend.
Grow technical leadership across the company by mentoring senior engineers and establishing a culture of rigorous review and honest technical debate.
Represent the company's technical depth to key customers, partners, and regulators, winning confidence in high-stakes programs.

What you will bring

Must-haves

12+ years of experience in unmanned aircraft, aerospace, or robotics, with multiple shipped products and deep expertise across the UAS stack.
Demonstrated organization-wide technical influence: architecture decisions, standards, or platforms adopted by multiple teams beyond your own.
Track record of mentoring senior engineers and building strong technical cultures that outlast any single program.
Deep understanding of flight dynamics, controls, avionics, and autonomy, with the judgment to know where rigor matters most and where it does not.
Experience with certification, airworthiness, or safety-critical development processes at meaningful scale.
Executive-level communication skills: you can brief a board on technical risk as clearly as you can whiteboard with engineers.
Bachelor's degree in engineering; advanced degree strongly preferred.

Nice-to-haves

Patents or publications in UAV-related technologies with real industry impact.
Experience scaling an engineering organization through rapid growth phases.
Background in defense or commercial certification programs with successful outcomes.
Prior P&L-adjacent responsibility or startup founding experience.