Software Systems Engineer

About the role

SAIC is seeking a Software Systems Engineer to own full stack development and technical maturation of a government software prototype as it transitions from research/prototype status to a Program of Record (PoR) for our customer site in North Charleston, SC.

Responsibilities

• Develop distributed systems for secure, reliable operation in degraded, bandwidth-limited, and autonomous environments.
• Build and maintain backend services, frontend applications, and infrastructure, hardening prototypes to meet DoD security, scalability, and operational standards.
• Implement secure data pipelines and protocols, ensure RMF compliance, support ATO accreditation, and follow secure development practices like container hardening and CI/CD security.
• Design segmented networks, real-time communications, hardware integration, and modular deployments for mission-critical applications.
• Create user-centric tools for tactical use, diagnostics, air-gapped provisioning, and deliver scalable, mission-aligned engineering solutions.

Qualifications

Required Education and Experience: Bachelors and five (5) years or more work experience; four (4) years of additional work experience accepted in lieu of degree.

• Demonstrated proficiency in Go and Python.
• Demonstrated ability to integrate heterogeneous hardware, communications links, containerized software services, and data pipelines into a unified, operationally deployable system. Preferably experience with multi-transport networking, pub/sub architectures, edge-to-cloud data federation, and API/protocol translation across diverse sensor or platform types.
• Active, hands-on use of AI development tools (e.g., Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, or similar AI coding assistants) as part of daily engineering work.
• Practical experience with cybersecurity-conscious software engineering — secure coding practices, vulnerability remediation, container/infrastructure hardening, or similar.
• Experience taking prototype/research-grade code and maturing it into a production, supportable system.
• Must be a US Citizen, no clearance required to start but must be able to obtain and maintain an active Secret clearance.

Desired Qualifications

• Direct experience supporting an ATO package (SSP development, control implementation, POA&M management, eMASS).
• Experience with containerization/orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes) and CI/CD pipeline security.
• Familiarity with DoD software acquisition processes and prototype-to-Program-of-Record transitions.
• Experience with cloud environments (AWS GovCloud or similar) in an accredited/compliance-driven context.
• Prior experience in a DoD, IC, or other federal contracting environment.
• Proficiency with React and Rust.
• Familiarity with the general lifecycle of moving a system through security accreditation (RMF, ATO, or equivalent commercial/compliance frameworks); prior direct ATO experience is a strong plus but not mandatory.