--- title: 'Senior/Staff Software Engineer, Motion Planning at PlusAI' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-software-engineer-motion-planning-plusai-santa-clara-x1pkbe5ekz4a' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-09-15' --- # Senior/Staff Software Engineer, Motion Planning at PlusAI - **Company:** PlusAI - **Location:** Santa Clara, CA - **Compensation:** $130k–$220k - **Employment:** full-time - **Work type:** hybrid - **Posted:** 2026-08-27 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-15 - **Apply:** https://jobs.lever.co/plus-2/4aab103f-545f-4600-bf99-8211f229ee60 ## Job description PlusAI is a Physical AI company pioneering AI-based virtual driver software for factory-built autonomous trucks. Headquartered in Silicon Valley with operations in the United States and Europe, Plus was named by Fast Company as one of the World’s Most Innovative Companies. Partners including TRATON GROUP’s Scania, MAN, and International brands, Hyundai Motor Company, Iveco Group, Bosch, and DSV are working with Plus to accelerate the deployment of next-generation autonomous trucks. If you’re ready to make a huge impact and drive the future of autonomy, Plus is looking for talented individuals to join its fast-growing teams. ## About the Team The Planning team is responsible for making sure PlusAI’s trucks make the right decision in every driving situation, safely, smoothly, and predictably for other road users, even when working with noisy, uncertain, or incomplete information about the world. This is a cross-functional problem that requires close collaboration with Perception, Prediction, Controls, and Safety, and a willingness to work at the edge of research and production: bringing state-of-the-art decision-making and optimization techniques into a system that runs on real trucks, on real roads, today. ## About the Role As a Senior Software Engineer on the Motion Planning team, you’ll research, develop, and implement planning technologies that let PlusAI’s trucks handle complex, real-world driving scenarios in a safe and human-like manner. You’ll work across the full decision-making stack, from reasoning about what the truck should do to determining precisely how it should get there, while accounting for the many ways a scenario could unfold. ## Responsibilities - Design and implement algorithms for decision-making and trajectory generation, ensuring safety, comfort, and reliability across a wide range of driving conditions. - Bring novel robotics and machine learning techniques from research into a production-grade, safety-critical system. - Reason about complex, socially-nuanced driving situations, such as negotiating merges, junctions, and interactions with other road users, under uncertainty. - Utilize modern C++ numerical optimization frameworks (e.g., CasADi, Acados) and industry-standard tooling (git, ROS, etc.) to integrate new planning algorithms into the production stack. - Partner closely with the ML and prediction teams to integrate, refine, and act on probabilistic and multi-future representations of how a scenario might evolve, shaping how these outputs are consumed by planning decisions. - Perform system-level diagnostics and tuning using in-house and open-source visualization tools (e.g., webviz). - Collaborate cross-functionally and communicate clearly, producing system designs that are reviewed and approved at a high level before implementation begins. Required skills - MS with 1-2 years of relevant experience, or PhD, in Computer Science, Robotics, or a related field. - Strong production software development skills in C++; Python experience a plus. - Robotics expertise in one or more of: path planning, motion planning, trajectory generation, behavior planning, optimal control. - Strong math (geometry, analysis, probability) and physics (kinematics, dynamics) fundamentals. - Experience designing, implementing, and refining planning algorithms on a real-world robotic or vehicle platform. - Strong oral and written communication skills, with the ability to collaborate across teams and derive solutions from cross-functional input ## Preferred skills - PhD + 1-2 years or MS + 3-4 years of relevant experience. - Bonus: exposure to machine learning techniques such as deep learning, imitation learning, transformer-based models, or diffusion-based models, particularly as applied to decision-making or scenario generation. - Familiarity with safety frameworks for autonomy (e.g., RSS, collision avoidance/MRM logic). - Prior experience working on safety-critical systems. ## Your opportunities joining PlusAI Work, learn and grow in a highly future-oriented, innovative and dynamic field. Wide range of opportunities for personal and professional development. Catered free lunch, unlimited snacks and beverages. Highly competitive salary and benefits package, including 401(k) plan. ## About PlusAI ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: PlusAI develops AI-based autonomous driving software for heavy trucks, powering Level 4 (L4) virtual driver systems that enable trucks to operate without human intervention on highways. - **Entity Type**: Private (planning to go public via a SPAC merger with Churchill Capital Corp IX, NYSE: PLAV – conflicting reports indicate the reverse merger may have been cancelled) - **Headquarters**: Santa Clara, California, United States - **Founded**: 2016 - **Founders**: Not publicly available in provided sources ## Core Business - **Primary industry**: Autonomous driving / automotive technology - **Target customers**: B2B – global truck manufacturers (OEMs) and large freight fleets - **Mission**: To make trucking safer, more efficient, and more sustainable by deploying AI-powered autonomous driving at scale ## Products & Services - **SuperDrive**: L4 autonomous driving system that serves as a virtual driver for factory-built heavy trucks. Designed to be installed by OEMs and monetized on a per-mile usage basis. - **PlusDrive**: A driver-assist version of SuperDrive that keeps a human in the cabin to oversee the system. Already in commercial use, reducing driver fatigue and fuel costs. - **SuperDrive HyperFoundry**: A suite of proprietary AV data and tools (data acquisition, auto-labeling, 3D reconstruction, neural simulation) sold to third-party customers today, generating revenue before the full L4 launch. ## Market Standing - **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not publicly disclosed; the SPAC merger was valued at $300M (conflicting reports of cancellation). - **Key Metric**: Annual revenue of $4M (as of latest data); total funding of ~$1.3B across 8 rounds. - **Notable Investors/Partners**: TRATON GROUP (Scania, MAN, International), Hyundai Motor Company, Iveco Group, Bosch, DSV, Ryder. - **Growth Signals**: - Active trial with Ryder and International on a 600+ mile daily route (I-35 corridor) – 60,000+ cumulative miles, approaching 100 runs. - Recent software upgrades enabling night driving and construction zone capabilities. - Partnered with multiple global OEMs to install SuperDrive on factory-built trucks – no retrofitting required. - 7M+ miles of L4-validated data collected. ## Competitive Advantages - **Asset-light software model**: Zero manufacturing capex – PlusAI is a pure-play software provider, avoiding heavy hardware costs. - **OEM integration**: Factory-installed by partners like TRATON and Hyundai, providing a scalable path to thousands of trucks. - **Proprietary data moat**: Over $500M in R&D investment and 7M+ miles of validated data enable advanced AI models (end-to-end and vision-language-action). - **Capital efficiency**: Path to cash-flow positive in 2027E, with lower OpEx than key competitors. ## Strategic Focus - **Near-term**: Commercial launch of driverless L4 trucks in 2027, targeting revenue from per-mile usage. - **Current revenue generation**: Selling AV data and tools (HyperFoundry) to third parties. - **R&D edge**: Leveraging large AI models and generative AI to continuously improve the virtual driver’s capabilities and expand the Operational Design Domain (ODD). ## Why Work Here - **Culture & ratings**: Employer rating of 4.1/5 (30 reviews), with high marks for work-life balance (4.6), culture (4.7), and career growth (4.6). - **Engineering focus**: 105 technical employees (23% of workforce); active job postings (38) include senior ML infrastructure, perception, planning, simulation, and engineering intern roles. - **Global offices**: HQ in Santa Clara, CA, with offices in Fremont, Cupertino, and Munich, Germany. Workforce spans 8 countries. - **Notable perks**: Opportunity to work on cutting-edge autonomous driving technology with partners like TRATON, Hyundai, and Bosch. Strong talent pipeline from Stanford, CMU, and alumni at Waymo, NVIDIA, Apple. ## Sources 1. [LinkedIn – PlusAI](https://linkedin.com/company/plusai) 2. [CB Insights – PlusAI](https://www.cbinsights.com/company/plusai) 3. [PitchBook – PlusAI](https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/180375-76) 4. [PlusAI Presentation (April 2026)](https://www.plus.ai/documents/plusai-presentation-april-2026.pdf) 5. [PlusAI Careers Page (Lever)](https://jobs.lever.co/plus-2) ## Other roles at PlusAI - [Program Manager - Japan (Bilingual Japanese/English)](https://feeny.ai/job/program-manager-japan-bilingual-japanese-english-plusai-santa-clara-0ahxgnsxxmm4) — Santa Clara, CA - [Software Verification & Validation Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/software-verification-validation-engineer-plusai-santa-clara-fv6fv3b784ja) — Santa Clara, CA - [Senior/Staff Software Engineer (Machine Learning Runtime), Motion Planning](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-software-engineer-machine-learning-runtime-motion-planning-plusai-3ayj39bayq6s) — Santa Clara, CA - [Senior/Staff Machine Learning Engineer (Reinforcement Learning), Motion Planning](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-machine-learning-engineer-reinforcement-learning-motion-planning-ww5yty7kqtr9) — Santa Clara, CA - [Senior/Staff Machine Learning Engineer, Motion Planning](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-machine-learning-engineer-motion-planning-plusai-santa-clara-4sa79vvqk8c2) — Santa Clara, CA - [Data Engineer (SE / Sr SE)](https://feeny.ai/job/data-engineer-se-sr-se-plusai-santa-clara-90rq3eg8kg6j) — Santa Clara, CA - [Software Engineer (SE / Sr SE), Fullstack](https://feeny.ai/job/software-engineer-se-sr-se-fullstack-plusai-santa-clara-ctmf6p8xwe3x) — Santa Clara, CA - [Senior Simulation Software Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-simulation-software-engineer-plusai-santa-clara-j0eghaqdq4hv) — Santa Clara, CA - [Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Perception](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-machine-learning-engineer-perception-plusai-santa-clara-av26fffj0ehh) — Santa Clara, CA - [Principal Engineer, Mapping and Localization](https://feeny.ai/job/principal-engineer-mapping-and-localization-plusai-santa-clara-pqv0j6919kv9) — Santa Clara, CA