Rowden

Edge computing for defence and security

Forward Deployed Engineer

Implementation & Technical Account ManagementUpdated on Nov 13

Full-timeBristol, UK£60k - £85k /yr

About the Job

Requirements

Strong software engineering fundamentals and practical programming experience in Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, Go, Java, or a similar language.
Strong understanding of Linux, networking, APIs, and modern software development practices.
Experience integrating, deploying, and troubleshooting software across cloud and/or on-premises environments.
Familiarity with containerisation and deployment technologies such as Docker and Kubernetes.
Experience working directly with customers or end users to understand problems and deliver technical solutions.
Ability to solve problems amid ambiguous or changing requirements and make pragmatic technical decisions.
Ability to communicate complex technical concepts clearly across Engineering teams, customer technical teams, and end users.
Ability to take end-to-end ownership of technical problems, from initial discovery through deployment and resolution.

Responsibilities

Embed with customers and end users to understand their missions, workflows, technical environments, and operational challenges.
Observe users’ work in practice and identify problems or opportunities that may not emerge through traditional requirements gathering.
Translate loosely defined customer problems into clear technical requirements, hypotheses, and achievable outcomes.
Build relationships with users and act as a trusted technical partner who understands their operational needs and the company’s technology.
Design pragmatic technical solutions using company products alongside customer systems and third-party technologies.
Develop prototypes and proof-of-concepts to test ideas with customers and validate technical approaches.
Develop integrations, scripts, tooling, configuration, and supporting software required to make deployments successful.
Work across software, APIs, data, infrastructure, and networks to solve end-to-end technical problems.
Adapt solutions to customer environments, including those with challenging infrastructure, security, connectivity, or operational constraints.
Make engineering trade-offs among speed, robustness, security, maintainability, and customer needs.
Own hands-on deployment of company products into customer environments.
Work directly from customer sites, particularly during discovery, trials, integration, and deployment.
Configure, integrate, deploy, test, and troubleshoot products across cloud, on-premises, and potentially disconnected or edge environments.
Diagnose technical issues across the full stack, resolving problems directly or working with specialist Engineering teams as required.
Act as the technical link between customers in the field and Product and Engineering teams.
Capture structured feedback, technical findings, and lessons from deployments.
Identify recurring customer requirements and opportunities to improve products.
Reproduce field issues and provide Engineering teams with clear technical evidence and context.

Desired Qualifications

Experience deploying or supporting systems in live operational or mission-critical environments.
Experience with one or more of AI/ML, data engineering, geospatial systems, or edge computing.
Experience deploying solutions into disconnected, bandwidth-constrained, or otherwise challenging environments.
Experience working in defence, national security, emergency services, or critical infrastructure.

We’re building the UK’s next generation engineering powerhouse, providing critical technology that strengthens national security and resilience.

We specialise in turning advances in sensing, AI, and communications into operational capability for the edge, where connectivity may be degraded or denied. Our work focuses on accelerating the deployment of technology, improving decision-making for frontline teams, and protecting people and critical assets in demanding environments.

Headquartered in Bristol, Rowden employs around 200 people and operates over 20,000 square feet of engineering and manufacturing facilities. We have a growing international footprint and are one of Europe’s fastest-growing engineering businesses.

About the role

This role sits at the intersection of customers, engineering and product, helping turn complex operational problems into deployed technical capability. It involves spending significant time working alongside customers at their sites and in their operational environments, developing a first-hand understanding of their challenges, workflows and constraints.

You'll take ownership of the technical success of customer deployments, from initial discovery and solution design through integration, deployment, testing and operational use. Working hands-on with Dovetail products and technologies, you'll configure, integrate and adapt solutions to meet real-world customer needs, while building a deep understanding of how customers use those products to identify opportunities to improve capability, usability and deployment.

The role requires operating effectively in ambiguous and fast-moving environments, where requirements may not be fully defined and solutions need to be developed iteratively with users. Throughout all of this, you act as a direct feedback loop between customers and Dovetail's Product and Engineering teams, ensuring lessons from the field inform future product development.

This is a forward-deployed role that requires significant time working at customer sites, with frequent travel across the UK and internationally.

Candidates must be eligible for SC clearance, with DV preferred (but not mandatory.)

More information about security clearance is available here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/united-kingdom-security-vetting-clearance-levels

Customer & problem discovery

Embed with customers and end users to understand their missions, workflows, technical environments and operational challenges.
Observe how users work in practice and identify problems or opportunities that may not emerge through traditional requirements gathering.
Translate loosely defined customer problems into clear technical requirements, hypotheses and achievable outcomes.
Build strong relationships with users and become a trusted technical partner who understands both their operational needs and Dovetail's technology.

Solution design & engineering

Design pragmatic technical solutions using Dovetail products alongside customer systems and third-party technologies.
Rapidly develop prototypes and proof-of-concepts to test ideas with customers and validate technical approaches.
Develop integrations, scripts, tooling, configuration and supporting software required to make deployments successful.
Work across software, APIs, data, infrastructure and networks to solve end-to-end technical problems.
Adapt solutions to customer environments, including those with challenging infrastructure, security, connectivity or operational constraints.
Make appropriate engineering trade-offs between speed, robustness, security, maintainability and customer needs.

Deployment & operational ownership

Take hands-on ownership of deploying Dovetail products into customer environments.
Spend significant periods working directly from customer sites, particularly during discovery, trials, integration and deployment.
Configure, integrate, deploy, test and troubleshoot Dovetail products across cloud, on-premise and potentially disconnected or edge environments.
Diagnose technical issues across the full stack, resolving problems directly or working with specialist Engineering teams where required.

Product feedback & development

Act as the technical link between customers in the field and Dovetail's Product and Engineering teams.
Capture structured feedback, technical findings and lessons from deployments.
Identify recurring customer requirements and opportunities to improve Dovetail's products.
Reproduce field issues and provide Engineering teams with clear technical evidence and context.

Essential

Strong software engineering fundamentals, with practical programming experience in Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, Go, Java or similar.
Strong understanding of Linux, networking, APIs and modern software development practices.
Experience integrating, deploying and troubleshooting software across cloud and/or on-premises environments.
Familiarity with containerisation and deployment technologies such as Docker and Kubernetes.
Experience working directly with customers or end users to understand problems and deliver technical solutions.
Strong problem-solving skills, with the ability to work through ambiguous or changing requirements and make pragmatic technical decisions.
Able to communicate complex technical concepts clearly across Engineering teams, customer technical teams and end users.
Comfortable taking end-to-end ownership of technical problems, from initial discovery through to deployment and resolution.

Desirable

Experience deploying or supporting systems in live operational or mission-critical environments.
Experience with one or more of AI/ML, data engineering, geospatial systems or edge computing.
Experience deploying solutions into disconnected, bandwidth-constrained or otherwise challenging environments.
Experience working in defence, national security, emergency services or critical infrastructure.

About the Company

Rowden

Edge computing for defence and security

Rowden Technologies designs and delivers mission-critical edge computing and distributed sensor systems for environments with limited or unreliable connectivity. It handles end-to-end design, integration, sovereign manufacturing, and long-term managed services to support defence, national security, and emergency services. Its products include Trove for frontline generative AI, Magos for cost-effective signal processing and communications production, and Dovetail for modular edge-system integration, enabling rapid, secure decision-making even in denied environments. The company differentiates itself by prioritizing edge solutions with low connectivity, acting as a prime systems integrator for large programmes, offering sovereign manufacturing and lifecycle support, and pursuing projects like automated ML deployment to UAS for AUKUS Pillar II to reduce dependence on traditional defence contractors.

Company size: 51-200
Company stage: Grant
Total funding: $33.7M
Headquarters: Filton, United Kingdom
Founded: 2017

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