Project Hydra | Senior Software Engineer - Robot Data Collection

Job description

**Role Overview** We are looking for a Senior Software Engineer to own the systems that power a large-scale data collection operation, including the collection platform, operator tooling, data pipeline, and fleet infrastructure. This is an engineering role. Day-to-day teleoperation is performed by a dedicated operator team that you direct — you build what they run on, and you own what comes out of it. **Project Details** - **Location:** 100% Onsite (Santa Clara, CA, US) - **Employment:** Full-time W-2, Monday–Friday, 9:00 AM–5:00 PM - **Start Date:** ASAP - **Contract Duration:** 12-month contract with possibility of extension - **Rate: $105/hour** ### What You’ll Do - Design, build, and maintain the software behind our data collection stations — teleoperation stack, multi-camera recording, and session tooling. - Deploy and upgrade that stack across the fleet without stopping collection; keep workstations, containers, and networking healthy. - Own the data pipeline end to end: automated validation, conversion into our dataset format, upload, metadata, and versioning. - Build the QA tooling that catches dropped frames, stream desync, bad calibration, and mislabeled episodes before data reaches training. - Direct a team of teleoperators — define task protocols and SOPs, onboard them on new tasks and embodiments, review session quality, and unblock them daily. - Own fleet reliability: calibration and firmware pipelines, sensor and end-effector integration, root-cause analysis of recurring faults, and vendor escalation. - Bring up new stations and new embodiments; report throughput, yield, and data health to the research team. ### What we need to see - MS in CS, Robotics, EE/ME, or a related field (or BS with equivalent hands-on experience). - 3+ years building software for real robot systems — not simulation only. - A system you designed and shipped that other people depended on daily, and that you kept running. - Strong Python and Linux; Docker, git, CI, and SSH-based fleet administration. - Robot middleware and real-time multi-sensor recording — ROS 2 or equivalent vendor SDKs. - Experience supporting a data collection or teleoperation operation: you have built the tools operators depend on and owned throughput and quality numbers. - Comfortable around robot hardware — arms or humanoids, dexterous hands, RGB-D cameras, and the calibration that keeps them honest. - Able to lead operators without formal authority: you write clear SOPs, train people, and communicate status without being asked. ### Ways to stand out from the crowd - Humanoid or bimanual platforms (Unitree, Fourier, ALOHA/ARX-class rigs) and dexterous hands. - XR teleoperation: Quest / PICO / Vision Pro, motion-capture gloves, whole-body retargeting. - Imitation-learning data tooling — LeRobot, HDF5/Zarr episode stores, dataset versioning, S3 at TB–PB scale. - Built internal dashboards or tooling for a production line or high-throughput lab. - Open-source contributions to robotics data or teleoperation tooling. #L1-CC1