Software Engineer

Brooklyn, United States
Full-time

About the role

We are looking for a Software Engineer with 2+ years of experience to join a tiny, high-impact team rebuilding air traffic control from the ground up. You'll be the second core engineering hire at a company founded by Tesla and SpaceX alumni, working on real-time, safety-critical systems that will bring modern ATC to the 90% of airports that have no tower today.

What will you be doing?

  • Building the core software for a remote ATC tower — perception, state estimation, and automation systems processing sensor data (video, audio, radar) in real time

  • Working on streaming data pipelines (ADS-B, voice, video) and making tradeoffs around latency, reliability, and safety

  • Developing the controller-facing HMI where controllers remotely monitor and manage airport traffic

  • Building pilot companion apps and tower-side software that processes low-latency speech-to-text and computer vision

  • Working cross-functionally with hardware, RF, and mechanical — you'll touch many parts of the system depending on your interests and abilities

Key Requirements

  • Experience shipping production systems in C++/Python or similar systems-level languages — strong generalist who can work across the stack

  • Background in real-time systems, embedded, firmware, or safety-critical software (aerospace, automotive, medical, robotics)

  • Must be based in or willing to relocate to NYC and work on-site 5 days/week at the Brooklyn Navy Yard office

  • Startup mentality — excited to iterate quickly, get hands dirty, and build first/second versions of systems from scratch

  • Demonstrated initiative building things outside of work (side projects, open source, hardware projects, etc.)

About General Aviation

General Aviation is rebuilding the air traffic control (ATC) system from the ground up to handle the ever-growing number of commercial and private aircraft, plus new users like drones and rockets.

The U.S. air traffic control system is decades old — built on radar and radio technology from the post-WWII era — and is bursting at the seams. Traffic has doubled and tripled since the system was designed, safety incidents persist, taxpayers spend $15-20 billion annually maintaining decrepit equipment, and there aren't enough controllers to staff the system. General Aviation is introducing modern technology as a new vendor to the FAA, aiming to do for air traffic control what companies like Anduril have done for defense.

With an early team including Tesla and SpaceX alumni with deep aviation backgrounds, General Aviation is tackling one of the most critical and underinvested pieces of public infrastructure. The company believes better ATC will give us cheaper flights, safer skies, and wider access to aviation.

The culture is intensely in-person, hands-on, and fast-moving. This is a small team where every person makes a massive impact — working across hardware and software, from sensor packages and RF systems to real-time perception, automation, and controller-facing applications. The team values engineers who build things, sustain interest in hard problems, and push through bureaucratic sludge to ship real products into the world.

Required skills

C++
Python
Next.js
React
Elixir
ADS-B
Computer Vision
Speech Recognition

Interested?

Let me introduce you to the founders.

Skip the process

Refer someone

Know someone great for this role?

Share your link. If they get hired through Standout, you get $3,000.

Job details

Salary

$140,000 - $250,000

Location

Brooklyn, United States

Experience

2+ years

Company

NameGeneral Aviation
Industrytransportation, hardware, government, ai, software_development
Team Size3

Funding

Total raised

$500K

Last stage

Seed

Investors

Y Combinator
Pioneer Fund
Rebel Fund

Founders

Ben Frank

Ben Frank

Founder & CEO

LinkedIn

What happens next.

No applications, no recruiter spam. Just the intro.

01

Confirm the fit

A few questions to make sure this role is the right shape for you. Two minutes.

02

I pitch you to the company

I write the intro, send it to the founder, and handle the back-and-forth.

03

A meeting lands on your calendar

If they’re a yes, I book the chat. You show up — that’s the whole job-hunt.