Lead Software Engineer

DHR Engineering is a fast-growing technology leader in industrial automation.

We design the next generation of production systems for some of the most ambitious and forward-thinking companies across the US and Europe. Our systems are deployed in real manufacturing environments for industry leaders and suppliers of SpaceX, Tesla, and Blue Origin.

DHR’s software engineering team focuses on intelligent machine and robotics control, production orchestration, and the optimization of manufacturing processes and workflows.

We’re relentless problem solvers who value precision, take ownership, and get things done. That’s how we’re building the future of manufacturing.

JOB OVERVIEW

We’re looking for a Lead Software Engineer to own the design and delivery of software systems behind our manufacturing automation projects.

You’ll lead the software side of projects that combine backend services, robotics, industrial equipment, and operator-facing applications.

This is a hands-on technical leadership role. You’ll be expected to take ownership of projects from requirements and system design through implementation, deployment, and production support. You’ll make major architectural decisions, define how different software and automation components interact, and work closely with engineers across software, robotics, controls, and mechanical disciplines.

We’re looking for someone who is comfortable operating with a high degree of independence: turning loosely defined manufacturing problems into robust software systems and driving them to completion.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Own the software architecture and technical delivery of manufacturing automation projects
• Translate customer and production requirements into practical software designs and implementation plans
• Make architectural decisions around service boundaries, APIs, data models, communication patterns, and system integration
• Build and evolve backend services for manufacturing execution, robotics orchestration, and automation workflows
• Develop production-grade Python services and APIs using technologies such as FastAPI
• Design REST, event-driven, and service-to-service communication patterns for distributed automation systems
• Design integrations between software, robotic systems, PLCs, industrial equipment, and external platforms
• Work with message brokers, asynchronous processing, and real-time data flows
• Drive projects from early technical discussions through implementation, commissioning, and production deployment
• Identify technical risks early and make pragmatic trade-offs between complexity, reliability, development speed, and maintainability
• Review designs and code and help establish engineering standards and best practices
• Mentor other engineers and provide technical direction when needed
• Collaborate closely with frontend, robotics, controls, and mechanical engineers to deliver complete automation systems
• Improve the reliability, observability, performance, and maintainability of deployed systems

REQUIREMENTS AND QUALIFICATIONS 

Required:

• 5+ years of professional software engineering experience, with significant backend or distributed systems experience
• Willingness to travel occasionally to customer sites in the US and Europe for system deployment and commissioning
• Strong Python experience and a track record of building production software systems
• Experience designing and building APIs using frameworks such as FastAPI, Flask, or Django
• Strong understanding of software architecture, API design, data modeling, and distributed systems fundamentals
• Experience with asynchronous programming, background processing, messaging, and event driven architectures
• Experience working with databases such as MongoDB, PostgreSQL, or similar technologies
• Experience with caching and state-management technologies such as Redis
• Strong understanding of Docker and containerized development and deployment workflows
• Experience taking ownership of significant technical projects from design through production
• Ability to make architectural decisions independently and communicate the reasoning and tradeoffs behind them
• Ability to work effectively with incomplete requirements and turn ambiguous problems into concrete technical solutions
• Strong debugging and problem-solving skills, including diagnosing issues across multiple services and system boundaries
• Strong Git-based development practices, testing discipline, and experience with CI/CD workflows
• Good communication skills and the ability to work directly with engineers, project stakeholders, and customers when necessary

Nice to Have:

• Experience with industrial automation, robotics, manufacturing software, MES, or hardware integrated systems
• Experience integrating software with PLCs, robots, CNC machines, sensors, or other industrial equipment
• Experience with MQTT, gRPC, WebSockets, or other real-time and message-based communication protocols
• Experience designing microservice or distributed system architectures
• Experience designing systems where reliability and predictable behavior are important because software interacts with physical processes
• DevOps experience, including service deployment, monitoring, logging, and production troubleshooting
• Experience leading or mentoring other software engineers
• Experience working directly with customers to define technical requirements and solution architectures

WHAT WE OFFER

At DHR Engineering, we move fast, solve real-world engineering problems, and build systems that operate in demanding production environments. We value ownership, technical depth, and practical execution.

As a Lead Software Engineer, you’ll have substantial influence over how our software systems are designed and how our software engineering practices evolve.

What you can expect:

• Competitive remuneration and additional health insurance coverage
• End-to-end ownership of significant automation software projects
• Work on software that directly controls real robotic and manufacturing systems
• A small, highly technical team where individual decisions have visible impact
• The opportunity to shape our software architecture, tooling, and engineering standards
• No unnecessary corporate structure or bureaucracy
• Accelerated career advancement for people who are eager to learn and grow
• Fast-paced environment focused on building, deploying, learning, and improving
• Close collaboration with multidisciplinary engineering teams across software, robotics, controls, and manufacturing

If you enjoy owning complex technical problems, making architectural decisions, and seeing the systems you build operate in the real world, we’d love to hear from you.