Machine Learning Perception Engineer

About Seasats:

We are a nimble, highly technical business that provides defense, scientific, and commercial customers with maritime robotics solutions. Our primary products are autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs) built to carry sensors at sea for months at a time.

The company is located in sunny San Diego and includes talented engineers, builders, tinkerers, and business architects. Internally, our work culture is hard working but fun. Externally, we’ve built a reputation for being professional, knowledgeable, and dedicated to getting the job done. For more info, check out seasats.com.

Role: Machine Learning Perception Engineer

Location: San Diego, CA (in-office)

Salary: $130,000-$150,000 / yr + stock options, 401k matching, and other benefits.

Role Overview:

Seasats’ vehicles operate in highly remote and often communications-limited environments. To complete persistent missions at scale, the vehicles must be able to operate autonomously, so Seasats has built a reliable and increasingly intelligent autonomy stack incorporating onboard sensors and processing.

In this role, you will help take that existing autonomy stack to the next level by spearheading the development and training of advanced perception models. You’ll leverage diverse sensor data—cameras, LiDAR, radar, acoustics —to create robust algorithms that empower our vessels to navigate safely and efficiently in dynamic environments.

About You:

• You’re deeply curious about how people and machines process data to perceive the world.
• You have a minimum of 3 years working on perception problems.
• You have a strong background in computer vision and knowledge of current ML models.
• You’re comfortable hammering out code in Python, and are well-versed in PyTorch and OpenCV.
• You’ve worked with foundation models and have trained smaller custom models from trainer models.
• You’re comfortable deploying algorithms and models to compute-limited edge devices.
• You’re comfortable working with real-time systems and sensors (cameras, LiDAR, radar, etc.).
• You have experience working with probabilistic algorithms for obstacle and target tracking.
• You’re competent at writing simple change detection algorithms for a variety of data types.
• You’re ok with getting multiple projects to 80% rather than getting one project to “perfect”. Conversely, you take great joy in seeing projects approach perfection over time.
• You have strong technical communication skills.
• You’re able to scope projects and features independently and efficiently.

Bonus points if you have experience working with:

• Maritime data.
• Radar data.
• Anomaly detectors.
• Acoustic spectrogram data.
• Path planning and control algorithms.

Role Details

You’ll be joining a growing software team based in San Diego and will be a full-time vehicle perception developer. This team will likely continue to grow, but initially you’ll be the only full-time dedicated perception engineer. As such, you will need to be able to work independently on experiments and collaboratively with the rest of the vehicle software team to incorporate your work into the larger stack. This is an excellent opportunity to do high impact work, see your code go into live field robotics applications, and join a fun and hard-working team on the cutting edge of ocean autonomy.

Some specific tasks might include:

• Scoping and running ML experiments with clearly measurable end states that would positively impact vehicle performance if successful.
• Analyzing and organizing datasets from our fleet to drive data-driven development.
• Communicating scope and goals with the software team to ensure that experiments can fit smoothly and efficiently into the vehicle stack.
• Leveraging and packaging open-source tools to comply with licensing.

Life at Seasats:

Along with your salary, you’ll receive perks including:

• Stock options
• Competitive insurance (including a 99% employer-covered Gold HMO plan or other options)
• 401k matching up to 4% of salary
• Four free lunches per week
• An employee activity fund
• A pet-friendly office
• Unlimited/Flex PTO

We’ll help you ramp up and will regularly take time to discuss what’s working and what’s not. We’re also big on personal freedoms: if you’re on top of your responsibilities and want the afternoon off to surf or spend time with friends and family, go for it! We have flexible hours, accommodating PTO, and a personable, high-achieving work culture. We want someone who’s excited to work hard and have fun in this environment.

Our values are listed below; we’re happy to explain them more during the interview process.

• Get Stuff Done
• Be Kind
• Fight Entropy
• Attack with Overwhelming Force
• Ask More Questions
• Lines, Not Dots

Hiring Notes:

If you decide to apply, you’ll be asked to provide a resume and answer a few screening questions. If we decide to move forward with your application, you can expect no more than 2-3 more rounds of virtual interviews before a final in-person interview. If you have to travel to San Diego, we’ll reimburse pre-approved travel costs.

Please note that we are currently unable to sponsor employment visas, so candidates must be independently authorized to work in the United States.

We appreciate diverse perspectives and life experiences, so we encourage women, minorities, and people of all backgrounds to apply. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

We look forward to reviewing your application!