Principal Software Engineer, Robotics

Principal Software Engineer, Robotics

With more than $1B in revenue, Tennant Company is a globally recognized leader in the cleaning equipment industry. For the past 150 years, we have been passionate about developing and manufacturing innovative and sustainable solutions for our customers. At Tennant Company, we are committed to stewardship and creating a cleaner, safer and healthier world. With manufacturing, operations and sales, service, and support functions across the globe, your journey at Tennant can take you places you never expected.

At Tennant Company, we’re redefining how the world cleans through intelligent, autonomous, and connected machines. Our Robotics Product Development team builds the software brains behind industry‑leading cleaning robots—and we’re looking for a Principal Software Engineer to help shape what’s next.

This is a senior technical leadership role for an engineer who thrives at the intersection of embedded systems, machine‑level software, and connected architectures. You’ll define and drive the software architectures that power complex robotic platforms—from low‑level hardware interfaces to secure, connected systems—while mentoring engineers and influencing the technical direction of our robotics portfolio.

Why This Role Matters

As a Principal Software Engineer, you are a technical authority and architect, translating product and business needs into resilient, scalable software systems. Your impact will be visible across multiple generations of robotic products, accelerating development velocity while maintaining technical excellence, safety, and compliance.

Success in this role is measured by:

• The strength and durability of the software architecture
• Seamless integration across embedded, mechanical, electrical, and connected systems
• The ability to guide teams through complexity and ambiguity with clarity and confidence

What You’ll Do

Software Architecture & Technical Leadership

• Own and evolve the software architecture for new and existing autonomous and robotic cleaning machines.
• Establish architectural direction emphasizing scalability, reuse, performance, maintainability, and security.
• Act as a technical authority across embedded and connected domains, including collaboration with external partners on third‑party controllers.
• Partner with Product Management, Systems Engineering, and other architects to translate portfolio‑level requirements into executable software designs.

Embedded & Platform Software Development

• Lead development of embedded platforms using C/C++ on Linux and/or RTOS
  .
• Provide hands‑on technical leadership in:
• Board bring‑up, kernel configuration, and device trees
• Driver development and hardware abstraction layers
• Debugging complex hardware/software interfaces
• Ensure clean integration with controls, electrical, and mechanical subsystems.
• Guide communication architectures across controllers using
  
  CAN, CANO
  
  pen, Ethernet, and USB.

Quality, Safety & Compliance

• Define and promote best practices across embedded, communication, and connected software.
• Design systems that meet regulatory and compliance requirements for robotics and connected products.
• Coding standards
• Architecture and peer reviews
• Advanced debugging, fault isolation, and root cause analysis

Development Process, Tooling & Dev Ops

• Lead software development through the New Product Development (NPD) lifecycle.
• Balance architectural rigor with execution speed in a fast‑moving product environment.
• Requirements management and traceability
• Source control (Bitbucket)
• Defect and workflow management (Jira)
• CI/CD pipelines and automated builds (Azure Dev Ops)

Cross‑Functional Leadership & Mentorship

• Collaborate closely with Hardware, Systems, Test, and Manufacturing teams from concept through qualification.
• Lead and participate in design reviews to ensure alignment with system‑level requirements.
• Mentor engineers at all levels, raising the technical bar and fostering strong engineering culture.
• Communicate complex technical concepts effectively to both technical and non‑technical stakeholders.

What You Bring

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Electrical, Software, or Computer Engineering.
• Minimum of 7 years of relevant…