Forward Deployed Engineering Manager

Tocaro Blue is seeking a Forward Deployed Engineering Manager to lead a small, highly capable team responsible for connecting our Proteus Core™ and Apollo Core™ platforms with real-world mission success. This role combines technical leadership, people management, customer engagement, and hands‑on problem solving in demanding operational environments.

You will manage a team of up to four FDE’s while remaining actively involved in customer deployments, system integrations, troubleshooting, and field operations. You will serve as a key technical and operational interface between Tocaro Blue, our customers, and our internal engineering teams, primarily supporting Unmanned Surface Vessel (USV) builders and other maritime sensing programs.

This is a hands‑on leadership role requiring approximately 50% travel to customer sites, test locations, and operational environments.

Tocaro Blue is transforming maritime technology by modernizing legacy marine sensors through innovative software solutions. Our flagship product, Proteus Core™, is an advanced software platform that integrates marine radar data with artificial intelligence and machine learning models to deliver real‑time situational awareness and support vessel autonomy systems. Our second and newest product, Apollo Core™, is a complementary machine learning solution that enhances marine EO/IR cameras with stabilization, object detection, and tracking to extend real‑time perception and situational awareness across electro‑optical sensors.

• Lead, manage, and develop a team of up to four Forward Deployed Engineers
  , providing coaching, technical guidance, prioritization, performance feedback, and professional development.
• Serve as a primary technical and operational point of contact for customers during integrations, demonstrations, testing, sea trials, and deployments.
• Lead deployment planning and execution, balancing customer priorities, engineering resources, schedules, technical risks, and mission requirements.
• Serve as a senior escalation point for complex field issues, bringing a structured and practical approach to diagnosing and solving problems under time and operational constraints.
• Remain technically hands‑on as needed, supporting the mechanical, electrical, networking, and software integration of Proteus Core™, Apollo Core™, and marine sensor payloads onto customer vessels, USVs, and other maritime platforms.
• Lead the deployment and testing of Proteus Core™ and Apollo Core™ in the field, identifying and resolving issues involving networking, perception, sensor fusion, hardware, software, and overall system performance.
• Plan and lead dockside testing and sea trials, ensuring teams, vessels, hardware, software, test plans, and customer stakeholders are prepared for successful execution.
• Analyze performance data and lessons learned from real‑world missions and deployments and translate those findings into actionable recommendations for engineering and product teams.
• Partner closely with ML engineering, software engineering, product, and company leadership to resolve customer challenges and improve the reliability, usability, and scalability of Tocaro Blue systems.
• Identify recurring field issues and drive root‑cause resolution rather than relying on short‑term fixes.
• Help determine team staffing, scheduling, travel, and resource allocation across simultaneous customer programs and deployments.

• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field such as ocean engineering, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, computer science, naval architecture, or a related technical discipline.
• 7+ Years of experience in leading, managing, mentoring, or developing technical personnel
  , with…