Staff Software Integration Engineer

Merlin (NASDAQ: MRLN)

is a publicly traded aerospace and defense company building a non-human pilot to deliver full-stack autonomy for any aircraft from takeoff to touchdown. The Merlin Pilot autonomy system powers a growing range of aircraft and mission profiles and has been proven through hundreds of autonomous flights from Merlin's global flight test facilities, including Kerikeri, New Zealand; Smithfield, Rhode Island; and soon, Bedford, Massachusetts. Headquartered in Boston, Merlin is expanding its organization to accelerate the development and deployment of its autonomy platform, helping customers solve some of aviation's most pressing challenges, from pilot shortages to improving flight safety. Backed by some of the world's leading investors prior to its public listing, Merlin continues to advance the certification and commercialization of autonomous flight across commercial and defense aviation.

About You:

Responsibilities:

• Own the architecture, development, and sustainment of real-time I/O software and telemetry infrastructure supporting aircraft integration benches and simulation environments.
• Develop modern C++ software on embedded Linux targets to interface with avionics hardware, manage periodic execution and watchdogs, and integrate generated aircraft simulation models.
• Develop and maintain hardware abstraction layers using UEI PowerDNA equipment, vendor SDKs, low-level I/O APIs, and device drivers.
• Integrate ARINC 429, CAN, serial, and discrete I/O using aircraft interface control documents; validate message encoding, signal mapping, update rates, and error handling.
• Develop and maintain asynchronous Rust services that ingest multiple telemetry sources, synchronize and order samples, and stream data to flight-test displays and recording systems.
• Implement robust binary protocols and network interfaces using UDP, TCP, and messaging technologies such as ZeroMQ, accounting for packet loss, ordering, buffering, and client liveness.
• Build capabilities for timestamp alignment, session recording, data retrieval, and simulation replay that make integration issues reproducible.
• Maintain cross-compilation, packaging, and deployment workflows for ARM Linux targets and Linux hosts, including Yocto SDKs, CMake, Debian packages, systemd, Docker, and Docker Compose.
• Establish automated verification through unit tests, hardware integration tests, parser fuzzing, and Python-based smoke tests and tooling.
• Partner with avionics, aircraft software, flight dynamics, and flight test engineers to reproduce aircraft integration conditions in the lab and resolve issues across software and hardware boundaries.

Qualifications:

Nice to Have:

This position is based on-site at Merlin HQ in Boston, MA.

Once you’re here, you’ll enjoy a variety of on-site perks designed to make your workday enjoyable and convenient. These include catered lunches featuring a rotating menu of delicious options, an assortment of snacks to keep you fueled throughout the day, and a selection of beverages, including coffee, tea, and other drinks, to keep you refreshed.

Our goal is to create an environment where you can thrive both professionally and personally.

Merlin Labs offers an innovative, entrepreneurial, and team-focused startup environment. We also offer a top-notch benefits package (health, dental, life, flexible paid time off, and 401k with match) and work/life integration. Being part of the Merlin team allows you to become part of a small team that supports professional development while working together to achieve our mission.

Merlin Labs is an equal opportunity employer and values diversity. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, genetic information, sex (including pregnancy), gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, military service or obligation or disability status, or any other characteristic protected by law. All job offers are contingent upon the candidate passing background and reference checks.

At this time, we are unable to provide visa sponsorship or consider candidates who require visa transfers. Applicants must be authorized to work in the United States without the need for visa sponsorship now or in the future.

In compliance with federal law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United States and to complete the required employment eligibility verification form upon hire.

If you require reasonable accommodation in completing an application, interviewing, completing any pre-employment testing, or otherwise participating in the employee selection process, please direct your inquiries to: [email protected]

Merlin Labs does not accept unsolicited resumes from any source other than directly from candidates.

Compensation: USD 200,000 – 265,000 per year salary