Software Quality Assurance Test Engineer

Who We Are:

Aurelius Systems is a VC backed defense tech startup building autonomous, edge deployed directed energy systems for counter-UAS. We build laser weapons to shoot down drones.

We're a small team of engineers, former US military operators, and subject matter experts scaling America's directed energy dominance. The first cost effective, reliable and robust laser weapon system.

Our namesake isn't an accident. Marcus Aurelius wrote about doing the work in front of you, every day, without excuses. Henry Ford didn't wait for permission to reinvent manufacturing.

That's how we operate — small team, unreasonable output, no hiding behind the unachievable.

In addition to our San Francisco lab, we’ve opened a Detroit manufacturing hub and we field test weekly on our own 400-acre private range.

The Role and Your Impact:

We need a Software, QA Test Engineer who lives in the lab and owns software cleanliness for Archimedes. You'll partner directly with our Principal Robotics SWE on CI/CD, regression infrastructure, and the pipeline that gets code from commit to a working system in the field. Test is a first-class engineering function here. You're a test builder for robotics system performance and validation, not a gatekeeper.

What You'll Own:

• Test infrastructure across unit, integration, end-to-end, and hardware-in-the-loop
• CI/CD pipelines, build health, and release gates
• Regression suites and automated test coverage across the robotics stack
• Bug triage and reproducibility — you find it, you reproduce it, you own it until it's fixed
• Release cleanliness for fielded software
• Lab time on real hardware, not test management from behind a desk

What We're Looking For:

• 3+ years building test infrastructure for robotics, hardware, or safety-critical software
• Strong Python and C++ test skills
• Built CI/CD pipelines from scratch and operated them in production
• Hardware-in-the-loop or rig-based testing experience
• Comfortable on real hardware, not just simulators

Where you probably come from: QA or test infrastructure roles at defense, robotics, automotive autonomy, automation tooling, or anywhere with HIL test rigs.

We want to talk if: You think test is a first-class engineering discipline, not a stage gate. You've built test infrastructure from scratch and you actually use it.

Not a fit if: Your background is manual QA only, you've never shipped a CI pipeline you built yourself, or you've never debugged on real hardware.

Nice to Haves:

• ROS2 testing experience
• Hardware-in-the-loop rig design
• Performance and stress testing on real-time systems
• Defense or safety-critical software release experience

Education:

BS in CS, EE, or equivalent. Track record matters more than degree.

How You Operate:

• Extreme bias for action. You ship working test infrastructure, not test plans
• You debug from first principles, not intuition alone
• Comfortable with ambiguity and fast iteration in a startup environment
• Clear communicator across software, hardware, and engineering teams
• Self directed. You identify what needs to happen next and do it without being told

Why Join Aurelius Systems:

• Build more in 1 month than most technicians build in 1 year. We field test weekly. Your work goes downrange, not into a filing cabinet.
• Career velocity is real. At ~10 engineers, there are no layers between you and impact.
• Work on a problem that actually matters. Small cheap drones are changing warfare. Our laser systems are the asymmetric answer — infinite magazine, near zero cost per shot, scalable to every base, border, facility, and truck.
• Join the densest defense startup ecosystem in the country. California is where the next generation of defense companies are being built.

How We Work:

Core hours are Monday through Friday, 9 to 6. When we're sprinting toward a demo or field test, the team ramps up — nights, weekends, whatever it takes to ship. When the sprint lands, we ramp down. We don't manufacture intensity for show.

Benefits:

• Competitive salary and equity
• United Health Care medical, dental, and vision coverage
• Flexible 18 days PTO plus 5 sick days
• Travel to field test events and range days
• Covered daily lunches and office snacks and drinks
• E-bike and scooter stipend up to $500
• Direct access to leadership and real ownership over your work

Export Control Notice:

This role requires access to export-controlled information or items that require U.S. Person status. As defined by U.S. law, individuals who are any one of the following are considered to be a U.S. Person: (1) U.S. citizens, (2) legal permanent residents (a.k.a. green card holders), and (3) certain protected classes of asylees and refugees, as defined in 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3).