Software Engineer – Advanced Systems - Draganfly Inc.

About Draganfly:

Draganfly Inc. (the “Company”) has been a recognized technology leader within the commercial UAV space for over two decades. We helped establish the commercial market & adoption of multi-rotor helicopters for public safety, agriculture, aerial imaging, & more. As a leader who helped shape the industry, Draganfly’s focus is on the sale of drone products and services, contract engineering & custom integration product development, and health monitoring products and services.

About The Role:

Draganfly Innovations is seeking a talented and forward‑thinking Software Engineer – Advanced Systems to join our growing engineering team, with a strong focus on real-time systems, autonomous operations, and remote command & control platforms. The ideal candidate brings experience building scalable, low-latency systems and has a passion for developing software that interfaces with hardware, sensors, and live data streams.

In this role, you will provide technical leadership, drive architectural decisions, and play a key role in delivering mission-critical software that powers Draganfly’s drone ecosystem. This includes systems for real-time video transmission, telemetry, edge-to-cloud data pipelines, autonomous capabilities, and remote fleet control. This role reports directly to the Director of Software Engineering.

You will collaborate closely with cross-functional teams, including product, autonomy, flight operations, AI/ML, and hardware engineering to deliver integrated, high-performance solutions.

Key Responsibilities:

• Lead the design, development, and delivery of real-time, distributed systems for drone operations and control.
• Architect and build platforms for low-latency video streaming, telemetry ingestion, and real-time data processing.
• Design and implement remote command and control systems for managing autonomous and semi-autonomous drone fleets.
• Develop scalable backend services and APIs that support mission planning, live monitoring, and control workflows.
• Contribute to systems enabling autonomy, including integration with AI/ML models, edge computing, and decision-making pipelines.
• Ensure high performance, reliability, and fault tolerance in mission critical, real-time environments.
• Demonstrate strong engineering discipline by writing clean, efficient, and maintainable code aligned with best practices.
• Provide technical leadership, mentorship, and code reviews to maintain engineering standards.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams (AI, hardware, FlightOps) to deliver end-to-end solutions.
• Troubleshoot and resolve issues in production systems with a focus on latency, throughput, and system resilience.
• Monitor system performance, analyze streaming/data metrics, and drive continuous improvements.
• Ensure robustness of real-time and mission-critical systems through rigorous testing, monitoring, and deployment best practices.
• Stay current with emerging technologies in real-time systems, robotics, autonomy, and distributed computing.

Who are you really?

• You take ownership end-to-end: from problem framing and architecture through implementation, deployment, and on-call support.
• You’re energized by real-time constraints (latency, jitter, throughput) and make trade-offs deliberately and transparently.
• You build reliable systems by default—instrumentation, testing, monitoring, and safe failure modes are part of your definition of “done.”
• You communicate clearly with both technical and non-technical partners and can align teams on decisions and priorities.
• You enjoy working close to hardware and operations—integrating sensors, edge devices, and live data streams into production systems.
• You mentor others through thoughtful code reviews, pairing, and pragmatic engineering standards.
• You’re comfortable in ambiguous, fast-moving environments and can turn evolving requirements into shippable increments.

Qualifications:

• 5+ years of professional software development experience, including real-time and/or distributed systems.
• Strong proficiency in one or more of: Python, C++, JavaScript/TypeScript.
• Experience building low-latency pipelines for streaming data (video, telemetry, sensor data) and/or real-time processing systems.
• Hands-on experience with low-latency communication protocols/technologies such as WebRTC, RTSP, gRPC, MQTT, and WebSockets.
• Proven ability to design and operate backend services, APIs, and microservices in production environments.
• Cloud experience (AWS, Azure, or GCP) and familiarity with edge-to-cloud architectures.
• Experience with CI/CD and containerization (Docker); Kubernetes experience preferred for orchestration.
• Working knowledge of databases (SQL and/or NoSQL) and patterns for high-throughput ingestion.
• Strong understanding of performance, scalability, reliability, and fault-tolerance principles.
• Experience working in Agile/Scrum teams; strong collaboration and communication skills.
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent practical experience).
• Willingness to travel as required.

Nice to have

• UAV/drone, robotics, or autonomous systems experience (e.g., ROS or similar middleware; autonomy/mission execution concepts).
• Video engineering experience: encoding/decoding, streaming optimization, or computer vision pipelines.
• Edge computing/on-device processing experience (resource-constrained systems, GPU/accelerator usage, offline-first patterns).
• Command-and-control (C2) platform exposure, fleet management systems, or mission-critical control software.
• Event-driven architecture experience and real-time messaging systems (e.g., Kafka or equivalent).
• Security experience for distributed systems and remote-control workflows (authn/authz, key management, secure comms).
• Observability expertise: distributed tracing, metrics, SLOs/SLIs, and performance profiling in real-time systems.
• Exposure to AI/ML integration patterns (model serving at the edge, perception/autonomy pipelines).

Compensation package:

• Competitive salary: $100,000 – $115,000
• Equity / Stock Options: Participation in the company’s stock option plan for long‑term growth alignment.
• Comprehensive medical and dental benefits, including a Health Spending Account (HSA).
• Matching RRSP program to support long‑term financial wellbeing.
• Generous time‑off program, including vacation, wellness days, and the full week off between Christmas and New Year’s.
• Professional development support to advance your technical skills and certifications.

Why Join Us:

At Draganfly Innovations, you’ll join a collaborative team that values innovation, curiosity, and continuous improvement. We’re in an exciting growth phase, scaling our technologies, product lines, and teams as we continue to shape the future of UAV innovation. Joining us now means becoming part of a company with deep roots in the industry - and bold ambitions for what comes next.

You’ll have the opportunity to make a meaningful impact, work on diverse and cutting‑edge projects, and grow your skills alongside passionate experts. We offer competitive compensation, strong benefits, and a supportive environment where your contributions truly matter. Here, you won’t just join a company - you’ll help build what comes next.

As part of our hiring process, all candidates must successfully complete reference checks and a criminal background check.