Senior Android Developer, ATAK

NGS builds modern geospatial and C5

ISR software for the U.S. Department of Defense and other federal customers. We've been at this since 2009, supporting programs across the U.S. military and the intelligence community. We're headquartered in the Charleston, SC area and we hold a GSA Multiple Award Schedule contract.

We leverage open-source technology and deep mission expertise to deliver secure, scalable systems that solve real problems for warfighters and government agencies. Our flagship platform, Core Spatial, is built on Geo Server, PostGIS, GDAL, MapStore2, and CesiumJS. We're serious about open source and stay engaged with the projects we build on.

We are a small, focused team with a strong track record of delivering complex solutions under real constraints. Our customers rely on us to cut through the noise, move fast, and deliver results that work. More on who we are, the team, and what we do for government customers.

We're hiring a Senior Android Developer to build and extend ATAK plugins for a medical common operating picture. The users are military medical teams, and the job is getting them the right picture of patients, resources, and the operating environment on the device they already carry.

The work is Java and Kotlin on Android, inside the ATAK plugin framework. You'll build plugin UI, handle Cursor on Target messaging, work with map overlays and geospatial data, and make sure it all holds up when the network doesn't. Disconnected and degraded comms are the normal case here, not the edge case.

You’ll be part of a distributed team working alongside a large prime contractor, in their tracker and on their release schedule. Being effective across company boundaries matters as much as the code does.

This is a senior seat. You should be able to own an ATAK plugin end to end, set technical direction, and be the person the team asks when something in ATAK or tactical mobile gets hard. We expect customer-facing production code from your first weeks, not after a long ramp. We are also hiring a Junior Android Developer alongside this role, and you will help bring them up.

• Design, build, and maintain ATAK plugins in Java and Kotlin
• Build operator-facing Android UI that works for users under stress, with gloves on, in bad light
• Implement CoT message handling and integration with TAK Server and other backend services
• Work with map layers, overlays, and geospatial data inside ATAK
• Handle offline, disconnected, and low-bandwidth operation gracefully
• Mentor junior developers and review code and design decisions across the mobile team
• Work day to day with a distributed partner engineering team: sprint planning, code reviews, joint debugging, release coordination
• Support integration events, demos, and test activity, including occasional troubleshooting under time pressure
• Follow secure coding practices and support DoD security and configuration requirements

• Five or more years of professional Android development experience shipping production apps
• Strong Java and Kotlin
• ATAK plugin development experience with the ATAK SDK (CIV or MIL). This is the part we can't teach fast.
• Familiarity with Cursor on Target (CoT) and TAK Server
• Mobile application architecture, lifecycle management, and performance optimization
• RESTful web service integration
• Android Studio, Gradle, Git, and modern CI/CD workflows
• Comfortable working in a Linux environment on an agile team
• U.S. citizenship. Active Secret or Top Secret clearance preferred, otherwise ability to obtain and maintain one.

• Experience with the TAK Product Center (TPC) SDK and TAK.gov developer resources
• Experience with medical, casualty tracking, or MEDEVAC workflows in a military setting
• Experience building for…