Robotics Software Engineer

In a world increasingly impacted by climate change, pollution, and population growth, conventional production of fresh/fruiting vegetables is unsustainable. Compared to field production, greenhouse hydroponic methods use 90% less water, increase yields, reduce food waste, use fewer pesticides, eliminate fertilizer runoff, and allow crops to be grown locally. However, greenhouse producers make up only a small part of today's market due to high capital/labor costs and operational complexity. To close this gap, Hippo Harvest uses new methods of hydroponics, robotics, and machine intelligence to re-imagine greenhouses and build the sustainable, economical, and scalable production systems of the future. The Role As a robotics software engineer, you'll work at different levels of the stack depending on the areas of greatest need. At the lowest levels, you'll approach the hardware/software divide from the software side, working closely with the hardware team to write embedded software that brings our mechanisms to life. You'll spend significant time on the code that runs on our mobile robots - laser-based localization, controls, and the state machines that create robot behavior. Specialized capabilities like watering, imaging, and environmental sensing come up periodically as well. You'll also work at the top of the robotics stack: our microservice-based control layer, which coordinates among different robot activities, handles failures, and presents interfaces for the various front-ends and scheduling systems used to operate our farm. Engineers with a problem-solving mindset who are excited to go deep across a diverse set of areas will love the scope and variety of this role. You Will Take robot capabilities end-to-end — from the embedded code on a mechanism, through robot-level autonomy, into the coordination layer, and out to reliable operation in a working greenhouse Pick up problems across that range as they arise and bring them to working solutions wherever they live in the stack Partner closely with the hardware, operations teams as well as other software engineers to debug and iterate on real robots in real conditions Use AI coding assistants effectively, and invest in the simulation infrastructure and guardrails that make AI-assisted development safe and productive on a codebase that ultimately runs on physical robots Spend 2–3 days a week at the farm in Pescadero, with the cadence shaped by what you're working on You Have Several years of experience writing production software in Python and a compiled language - ideally Rust or C++. Hands-on experience with a meaningful subset of the layers this role spans: embedded development on microcontrollers, robot localization, real-time controls, state machine design, or distributed/microservice coordination systems. Comfort working close to hardware, and a willingness to debug on physical robots rather than relying solely on simulation Practical fluency with AI coding tools and a point of view on what makes them effective. We rely on AI coding assistance heavily, but also expect individuals to take responsibility for the accuracy of their output. A problem-solving mindset and genuine enthusiasm for going deep across a diverse set of technical areas Additional nice-to-haves are experience with camera capture and image processing, IoT-style devices, and agricultural robotics We Offer An exciting and fun work environment where your contributions will make a true difference A hybrid work environment, with 2-3 days a week in person at our Pescadero facility, and 2-3 days a week working from home Full benefits package including six weeks of paid vacation, medical/dental/vision/life insurance, twelve weeks of paid parental leave, 401k with company match, company stock options #J-18808-Ljbffr Hippo Harvest, Inc.