QA Engineer

About us

DroneOps specializes in advanced navigational systems for UAV operations. Our focus is on developing robust solutions that enhance UAV autonomy and reliability, facilitating operations in environments where traditional GPS may be compromised. Our technology is designed to be integrated across a range of UAV platforms, delivering precision, resilience and cost-effective enhancements to existing hardware.

Overview

We are looking for a QA Engineer to own quality for our R&D software team that builds onboard navigation software for UAVs.

This is a hands-on lab and process role, not a pure web-automation job. You will test internal R&D tooling, run and verify camera and sensor calibration on real devices, and own pre-release and release checks so that every candidate version is validated on hardware before it reaches flights or users.

Our team is small and cross-functional. You will sit next to the engineers who build the product. We do not expect you to already know our full stack — if you are solid at QA, careful with checklists and logs, and comfortable in a Linux terminal (SSH, reading output, following a how-to), we will teach you the rest.

Must-have skills

• 1.5–3+ years of commercial experience in QA (mid-level; we grow people who learn fast)
• Strong manual testing: test design, regression and exploratory testing, bug life cycle
• Writing test cases, checklists, verification reports, and clear bug reports (steps, expected vs actual, attachments)
• Linux terminal: SSH, navigating the filesystem, copying logs, following shell how-tos
• Git at a basic level (pull, checkout, reading diffs / commit history)
• Turning a test run into a short release quality summary the team can act on (go / no-go, what failed, where)
• At least Intermediate English (reading docs, written async communication); Ukrainian for day-to-day team talk

Nice to have skills

• Hands-on experience with Raspberry Pi, embedded Linux, or any single-board computer
• Docker / docker-compose (running a container from a how-to is enough to start)
• Camera or sensor calibration experience (robotics, computer vision, or industrial setups)
• Hardware–software integration testing (bench stands, serial / USB devices, reading device logs)
• Python for small test scripts or tooling (nice, not required on day one)
• Test reporting tools (Allure, TestRail, Qase, or similar)
• Ability to work with physical hardware carefully: connect cables, flash or set up a device from a documented procedure, notice when something looks wrong

Your tasks may include

Testing R&D tooling

• Manual testing of internal tools used for development, integration, calibration and log analysis
• Reviewing tickets early and flagging gaps or untestable criteria before work ships
• Maintaining regression checklists for the areas you own
• Filing bugs with enough context (version, device, stage, logs) that engineers can reproduce quickly

Calibration and hardware checks

• Performing and verifying camera and sensor calibration on navigation modules (including day and thermal cameras) using documented procedures
• Checking that calibration outputs look sane and escalating odd results
• Flashing or provisioning test devices, connecting them to a hardware-in-the-loop bench, and running smoke and stability checks over SSH
• Collecting device and system logs and calibration artifacts to support bug reports

Pre-release and release verification

• Owning pre-release verification for release candidates: prepare the device, run verify and smoke checks, calibrate, and run multi-hour stability tests on the agreed test setups
• Supporting release verification: clear pass / fail status, known issues, and go / no-go input before a version goes further
• Triaging failures: product bug vs procedure / environment vs flaky tooling — and routing to the right person
• Keeping verification checklists and how-tos accurate as processes evolve
• Working with engineers on test data, fixtures and bench environments so checks stay repeatable

What we offer

• Competitive salary
• Office in Kyiv with shelter access, generator and Starlink
• On-site work with access to hardware and lab facilities
• Possibility of hybrid work format (lab days required for hardware verification)
• Impact on improving our country's defense capabilities
• 21 days of vacation + public holidays, sick leaves