Robotics Engineer

Applications: candidates may apply from outside Japan. Visa sponsorship: available. Japanese: Not required. English: Business level. Japan Dev tags: Engineering, Eng - Other.

About AIRoA

AI Robot Association (AIRoA) is an organization dedicated to collecting large-scale real-world robot data, including data from humanoid robots, and advancing the development of foundation models for generative AI in the field of robotics.

AIRoA has been selected as an implementing organization for the development of a data platform for generative AI foundation models in robotics under the “Post-5G Information and Communication Systems Infrastructure Enhancement R&D Project” by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and NEDO. The project budget is JPY 20.5 billion.

Based on this foundation, AIRoA is pursuing a project to collect humanoid robot operation data at a scale of one million hours using more than 100 robots, and to develop a world-class Vision-Language-Action (VLA) model utilizing this data.

Robotics Engineer (System Integration)

Responsibilities

In this role, you will be responsible for the following:

• Integrating and verifying ROS/ROS2-based robot software, data acquisition interfaces, and various modules that operate on humanoid robots and mobile robots.
• Designing and implementing state management, mode switching, and system interfaces to ensure safe and stable operation on real robots, in collaboration with teleoperation, control, navigation, and AI/VLA-related modules.
• Promoting integration testing, real-robot evaluation, and issue isolation for robot software using both simulation environments and physical robots.
• Working closely with the Vision-Language-Action (VLA) team to support software interfaces, state management, and connections to evaluation environments for running VLA models and trained policies on real robots.
• Designing robust robot software and hardware systems that operate stably in real-world environments.
• Diagnosing, debugging, and optimizing performance issues across perception, control, and system integration layers.
• Collaborating with cross-functional teams to integrate research prototypes into common platforms and applications so that they can operate reproducibly on real robots.

Required Qualifications

• Master’s or Ph.D. degree in robotics, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, computer science, or a related field, with at least three years of relevant industry experience, or equivalent practical experience.
• Hands-on experience in developing, integrating, and debugging physical robots or mechatronic systems, including dual-arm mobile manipulators and humanoid robots operating in real-world environments.
• Experience controlling real robot systems using ROS/ROS2, including full-stack system integration and deployment experience, or experience integrating and verifying multiple robot software modules on physical robots.
• Ability to understand interfaces among multiple components, such as sensors, actuators, control systems, AI modules, and UI, and to connect and verify them on real robots.
• Strong programming skills in C++ and Python, with the ability to write production-quality code and perform system-level integration.
• Ability to work independently while collaborating effectively within multidisciplinary engineering teams.
• Experience developing, integrating, and verifying reliable robot systems in production or real-world operational environments.

Preferred Qualifications

• Publication record at renowned international robotics conferences or journals.
• Experience transitioning complex robot systems from prototype stage to real-robot verification and practical operation.
• Experience with tactile sensing, contact-rich manipulation, teleoperation, and integration with control modules.
• Experience in software integration related to robot data acquisition, real-robot logs, evaluation data, and multi-robot operations.
• Experience using robot simulators such as Isaac Sim or MuJoCo for training and evaluation.
• Experience connecting and evaluating simulation environments, trained policies, or Vision-Language-Action (VLA) models with real robot systems.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines and system verification methods for robotics applications.
• Experience developing evaluation tools, visualization tools, diagnostic tools, or operational support tools for robotics.

Benefits

Few initiatives globally match the scale of this project in collecting large-scale robotic data and developing foundation models for embodied AI. As part of one of Japan’s leading national programs, the project is supported by a 20.5 billion yen investment from NEDO.

This role will be central to the project’s success. You will have significant ownership and technical autonomy, with the opportunity to shape core systems that define the future of large-scale robotics and embodied AI.

Engineers are strongly encouraged to grow their careers through this initiative—for example, by leading system deployments, contributing to open-source robotics software, and driving engineering excellence across large-scale robotic platforms.