Autonomous Vehicle Field Specialist, Customer Operations

The companyOutrider is a software company that is automating distribution yards with electric, self-driving trucks. Our system eliminates manual tasks that are hazardous and repetitive while it improves safety and efficiency. Outrider’s mission is to drive the rapid adoption of sustainable freight transportation. We are a private company founded in 2018 and backed by NEA, 8VC, Koch Disruptive Technologies, and other top-tier investors. Our customers are Fortune 200 companies and our autonomous trucks are already running in distribution yards. For more information, visit www.outrider.ai
The role The Autonomous Vehicle (AV) Field Specialist position will report to the Sr. Mgr. Customer Operations and support the Dispatch Engineers and AV Field Technicians.  The goal is to ensure customer operations have full coverage during deployments.  This position will ensure the safe operation and tasking of the AV. 
-- In the AV Dispatcher role, duties will include assigning trailer move requests to the autonomous trucks (aka terminal tractors, hostlers, shifters, dogs, goats) operating at customer distribution yards and managing truck movements via Mission Control, Outrider’s proprietary, cloud-hosted dispatching/monitoring tool. The AV Dispatcher may interact with customer dispatching functions (either humans or the customer’s yard management system/YMS) as needed to assign, track and update the status of customer-requested trailer moves. This requires close monitoring of system performance and productivity as well on-point suggestions for improvements to the UI, workflow, and overall system. 
-- The AV Field Technician responsibilities include monitoring the vehicle and driving environment; determining whether and how to return the vehicle to a minimum-risk condition; intervening in automated driving tasks to resume manual or computer control for safety and performance assessment purposes. 
This role is hands-on, requiring acute attentiveness to the vehicle system during operation, as well as constant observations of its performance both in the cab and via a software-based dispatching/monitoring tool.  This position plays an essential role in helping deliver a safety-critical system for industrial automation. The opportunity offers the successful candidate the chance to help develop a market-defining enterprise product that combines robotics technology with a software-as-a-service (SaaS) business model.

Duties & responsibilities

• Dispatch Engineer
• Maintain communication with customer site operations team
• Check-in and check out daily with the customer site operations team at the beginning and end of AV operations
• Explain each mission to both the Autonomous Vehicle Safety Driver and Ground Safety Technician (when applicable) prior to sending any tasks to the autonomous truck
• Quickly learn, use, and optimize yard operations workflows with the Outrider user interface, assigning trailer move requests to all autonomous yard trucks
• Refer to and/or use customer software applications, including warehouse management systems (WMS) and yard management systems (YMS), as needed
• Record all necessary information to report system performance and agreed-upon customer key performance indicators (KPIs)Ensure a site safety brief is conducted each day before AV operations begin, as well as whenever site conditions change (i.e. inclement weather)
• Be informed about, and operate strictly within, the Site Safety Plans that Outrider agrees to with every customer for site operations
• Conduct a site inspection of all Outrider workspaces at the beginning and end of each day
• Understand and support customer site-specific rules, procedures, and other operational requirements, and interact with customer personnel as required
• Coordinate with Outrider engineering teams to determine plans to resolve system/operational issues and execute those plans as quickly as possible to resume operations
• Escalate issues internally and externally, as necessary, to ensure prompt resolution
• Travel and perform fieldwork in locations other than those originally assigned, as needed
• Train customer employees in the use of the Outrider System
• Communicate with customers in a professional and courteous manner


• AV Field Technician
• Safely operate vehicles, either in the cab or remotely via a web-based dispatching/monitoring user interface, for 8-10+ hours per day
• Be a steward of the safety mindset: conduct daily on-site safety inspections of the trucks, equipment, and area, and proactively propose safety improvements
• Use keen judgment to determine appropriate on-the-spot responses to vehicle performance and safety issues
• Provide insightful and thorough verbal and/or written test reports on system performance - including vehicle and system data and/or o