Forward Deployed Engineer, US

About the company

UFORCE is a Ukrainian-origin defense technology company developing autonomous naval drones, strike UAVs, and anti-drone platforms.

About this role

UFORCE is a combat-systems integrator transforming Ukrainian battlefield experience into deployable defence technology for allied nations. Built by Ukrainian practitioners and global technology leaders, UFORCE brings together unmanned air, sea, and land systems, software, command-and-control, and operational expertise into one adaptive combat architecture. Our mission is to make defence dramatically faster, more scalable, and more cost-effective than traditional military systems — helping free nations deter aggression by making defence 100× cheaper than offence. We are building a new category of defence company: combat-proven, open to allied integration, shaped by real-world frontline experience, and focused on protecting democratic societies at speed. ABOUT THE ROLE UFORCE is hiring a US Forward Deployed Engineer to deploy forward with customers and internal teams to make UFORCE systems work reliably in real-world environments. This role is focused on UAS and/or USV systems across exercises, red-team events, demos, and customer operations. You will own end-to-end field integration, troubleshooting, and customer success across one or more technical disciplines — systems, networking, hardware, autonomy, software, electronics, or payload integration — and turn field learnings into repeatable kits, test plans, playbooks, and engineering improvements. This is a hands-on, high-ownership role for someone who can operate calmly under pressure, translate between operators and engineers, and make mission-ready capability the standard. WHAT YOU’LL DO - Deploy forward to customer sites, ranges, exercises, and operational environments to prepare, integrate, test, troubleshoot, and sustain UFORCE systems. - Lead technical readiness for major exercises, red-team events, and customer contracts, including pre-ship, arrival, pre-mission, and go/no-go gates. - Own field incident response: diagnose issues, create minimal reproductions, capture evidence, coordinate fixes, and drive root-cause closure. - Build deployment evidence packages, including configuration baselines, network diagrams, spectrum/safety approvals, software versions, test results, and logs. - Create and maintain standardized deployment kits, spares packages, images, configs, scripts, and field playbooks. - Partner with engineering teams to convert field failures and operator feedback into validated software, autonomy, hardware, network, payload, and process improvements. - Maintain customer and internal operating cadence through crisp status updates, risk tracking, decision logs, AARs, and action-item closeout. - Help train operators, maintainers, and internal teams so deployments become more repeatable over time. WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE - Supported major exercises and customer operations with strong technical readiness, high mission availability, and no mission-stopping technical aborts attributable to integration or setup. - Reduced recurring field issues and MTTR through disciplined troubleshooting, evidence capture, and root-cause resolution. - Established complete, repeatable deployment evidence kits and AAR processes that help the team move faster without sacrificing safety, compliance, or configuration control. - Built deployment kits and playbooks that reduce setup-to-ready time and make sustainment easier in austere environments. - Delivered field-driven engineering improvements that are validated on range and reflected in released builds or configurations. WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR - Deep hands-on experience in at least one relevant technical specialty: systems engineering, network engineering, autonomy, software, electronics, payload integration, or hardware. - Experience working with UAS and/or USV systems, or closely related deployed robotics, autonomy, defense, maritime, aerospace, or field-engineered systems. - Strong field integration instincts: configuration baselines, build-to-deploy workflows, imaging, version control, automated checks, and release discipline. - Practical networking knowledge, including IP planning, routing/switching, RF/spectrum constraints, secure comms basics, logging, and telemetry. - Strong troubleshooting toolkit: logs, packet captures, electrical debugging, scripting, automated checks, and disciplined test planning. - Ability to operate in environments requiring access control, least privilege, auditability, and sound security posture. - Clear communication with customers, operators, engineers, PMs, and executives — especially under time pressure. - High ownership, strong judgment, and a bias toward evidence-based execution over hero debugging. REQUIRED - US citizen. - TS/SCI cleared or credibly eligible. - Willing to deploy forward for exercises, red-team events, demos, and customer operations. - Comfortable working hands-on in austere environments such as shipboard, range, remote, or irregular-hours settings. NICE TO HAVE - Prior FDE, FSR, field engineering, or deployment experience supporting defense programs, exercises, SOCOM, Navy, Army, or similar users. - Experience with autonomy tuning, GNSS-denied environments, EW/spectrum coordination, safety-of-flight, or safety approvals. - Experience building evidence or compliance kits, including configuration management, test artifacts, and ATO-style workflows. - Instructor mindset and experience training customers, operators, maintainers, or internal teams. HOW WE WORK We optimize for mission readiness, evidence-based execution, tempo with safety, and customer trust. The right person for this role is a systems thinker and hands-on doer who can move from symptoms to hypotheses to tests to fixes — while keeping operators, customers, and engineering teams aligned. The nature of combat has changed. Tomorrow’s battlefield success depends on autonomy, speed, and adaptability. And UFORCE is ready. Are You?