Robotic Autonomy Engineer
Description
Hydromea is an innovative Swiss underwater robotics and communication company. The company enables subsea data harvesting at scale in the energy, defence, marine science and water-intensive industrial sectors with its patented and industry leading solutions. This solution reduces cost, increases safety of operations and helps driving down CO2 emissions. We are passionate about pushing the boundaries of underwater exploration and providing our partners with the tools they need for efficient and sustainable operations and critical submerged asset security.
Responsibilities
• Lead and develop the autonomy stack for underwater inspection drones
• Build cutting-edge SLAM and sensor fusion systems using cameras, acoustic sensors, and IMUs
• Design autonomous behaviors such as navigation, exploration, docking, and inspection missions
• Develop photogrammetry pipelines to reconstruct underwater environments from multi-sensor data
• Develop and maintain sensor drivers for cameras and acoustic sensing systems
• Work primarily on NVIDIA Jetson platforms for onboard autonomy and embedded perception
• Take systems from simulation to reality, testing in pools, lakes, and real subsea environments
• Own features end-to-end, from architecture to real-world deployment
• Deploy and iterate directly with customers and R&D partners across industries
• Build and maintain robust CI/CD pipelines and ensure high software quality in production systems
• Work closely with a multidisciplinary team spanning robotics, electronics, and product
• Use modern engineering tools including Git, Linux, CMake, Docker, and CI/CD systems
Qualifications
• Swiss work permit or EU/EFTA/CH citizenship is required.
• MSc in Robotics, Computer Science, or similar
• 3+ years building real robotics or autonomy systems
• Strong expertise in perception, SLAM, and sensor fusion
• Solid understanding of graph-based optimization (GTSAM, g2o, Ceres)
• Strong robotics fundamentals: sensors, real-time systems, embedded constraints, failure handling
• Expert-level C/C++ and Python
• Experience with ROS2
• Strong understanding of visual-inertial odometry
• Experience with stereo camera systems (feature tracking, depth estimation, reconstruction)
• Solid experience with simulation tools (Gazebo Ignition or equivalent)
• Comfortable with modern tooling: Git, CMake, Linux, CI/CD, Docker
• Experience shipping software on real systems
• Ability to work across disciplines and own complex problems end-to-end
• Clear communicator in English, especially for technical discussions and writing research proposal (grant applications)
Bonus points
• Camera-to-IMU and camera-to-camera calibration experience
• Knowledge of point cloud processing and 3D perception
• Experience with robot control (PID, inverse kinematics, control systems)
• Experience with NVIDIA Jetson platforms
• Exposure to deep learning applied to robotics or perception
• Experience in embedded systems, electronics, or mechanics
• Exposure to underwater robotics or harsh environment robotics