Embedded Software Engineer, Parallel
Vehicle Software
$132-152k
Powering autonomous rail
Be an early applicant
Powering autonomous rail
21-100 employees
Be an early applicant
$132-152k
21-100 employees
Company mission
To provide a safer, more efficient, and sustainable alternative to short-haul trucking, seamlessly integrating with existing rail operations and powering the future of freight.
Role
Who you are
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, Robotics, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
- Experience programming in C, C++, Rust, or another systems programming language through coursework, internships, projects, or professional experience
- Familiarity with embedded systems, microcontrollers, or real-time software development
- Understanding of common digital communication protocols such as SPI, I2C, UART, or CAN
- Familiarity with basic software concepts such as state machines, interrupts, memory management, and hardware interfaces
- Hands-on experience debugging technical systems through academic projects, internships, student teams, personal projects, or professional work
- Strong problem-solving skills and an interest in working directly with hardware
- Willingness to learn Rust and modern embedded software development practices
Desirable
- Internship, co-op, research, or project experience developing embedded software
- Experience with bare-metal or RTOS-based development
- Familiarity with oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, debuggers, or other hardware debugging tools
- Experience with robotics, autonomous systems, automotive, aerospace, industrial automation, or similar hardware-focused projects
- Exposure to control systems, PID controllers, or motion control
- Coursework or project experience in electrical engineering or digital electronics
- Experience with Rust or interest in developing production embedded software in Rust
What the job involves
- Parallel Systems is seeking an Embedded Software Engineer to help develop the embedded systems that power our autonomous rail vehicles
- In this role, you will contribute to real-time software that interfaces directly with hardware components, sensors, and control systems to support safe and reliable vehicle operations
- This is an early-career role for an engineer looking to build strong foundations in embedded software development, hardware-software integration, and real-time systems
- You will work closely with experienced software and hardware engineers while gaining hands-on experience developing and testing software on production hardware
- Develop and maintain embedded software for bare-metal and RTOS-based systems
- Implement and test digital communication protocols such as SPI, I2C, UART, and CAN
- Contribute to state machines and command/control software for autonomous vehicle systems
- Write reliable, memory-conscious embedded software, primarily in Rust
- Work with hardware engineers to integrate, debug, and validate hardware-software interfaces
- Develop unit and integration tests for embedded software using hardware test stands
- Debug software using standard embedded development tools and techniques
- Participate in code reviews, design discussions, documentation, and continuous improvement of engineering practices
- What Success Looks Like
- After 30 Days: You understand the basics of our embedded architecture, development environment, and hardware platforms. You are contributing small code changes, tests, and bug fixes with support from the team
- After 60 Days: You are independently implementing and testing well-scoped embedded software features and becoming comfortable debugging software on target hardware
- After 90 Days: You have delivered embedded software that has been validated on target hardware, can independently own smaller features or subsystems, and are contributing effectively to the team's development and testing practices
Our take
The huge freight networks of the U.S. currently face the significant challenge of optimizing their supply chain logistics whilst meeting regulations for the mitigation of global warming. Whilst electric trucking startups provide a small-scale solution, the $700B industry is enormous, and replacing trucks would be unaffordable to most companies.
Parallel designs autonomous, zero-emissions freight transportation systems for railways, providing a sustainable alternative to freight trucking. The automated rail vehicles use existing railway networks to increase infrastructure utilization and open railroads to new markets, whilst providing an alternative to logistics companies that is safer, faster, zero-emission, and lower cost.
While the company faces competition in fellow autonomous railcar company Intramotev, Parallel shows promise to disrupt the market by being based on pre-existing infrastructure that is faster, safer, and cheaper than road-based logistics. Through this approach, the company can help logistics companies become carbon-neutral whilst increasing their access to railway freight, thus saving them money and boosting opportunities for revenue growth.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
66% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 3 rounds)
Apr 2025
$38m
SERIES B
Jan 2022
$49.6m
SERIES A
Total funding: $91.2m
Company HQ
Arts District, Los Angeles, CA
Leadership
Matt Soule
(Founder & CEO)Prior to Founding Parallel in 2020, Matt spent 13 years at SpaceX, joining in 2006 as an Avionics Engineer. They then held various roles at the company before becoming a Principal Avionics Engineer. Before this, they were an Electrical/Controls Engineer at Northrop Grumman and an Electrical Engineer at Lockheed Martin.
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