Principal Software Engineer
Location: Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Contract Duration: 12 months
Rate: £63.83 p/h PAYE (£73.11 inc. holiday rate) OR £87.04 p/h Umbrella
We seek an engineer with recent high-integrity or safety-critical industry experience (defence, aerospace, or similar), or eligible for UK security clearance.
Role Overview
An experienced Principal Software Engineer is required to join a well-established Test Engineering community, supporting advanced defence and aerospace programmes. The role focuses on developing software solutions for complex test systems used in cutting-edge radar and aerospace platforms.
The successful candidate will play a key technical leadership role, contributing to the design, development, and delivery of high-quality test software while working closely with multi-disciplinary engineering teams and stakeholders.
Key Responsibilities
Design, develop, and deliver software solutions within defined work packages, ensuring stakeholder requirements are met
Elicit, analyse, prioritise, and manage stakeholder needs to deliver optimal technical solutions
Produce high-quality, robust, and well-documented code, ensuring outputs are maintained under configuration management
Provide progress reporting, planning, and technical updates to line management
Collaborate with internal and external stakeholders to ensure software architecture alignment across the wider programme
Apply appropriate tools and techniques for test equipment and test system software design
Identify, resolve, and drive solutions to emerging technical issues, escalating complex risks where required
Mentor, coach, and support the development of engineers within the wider team
Essential Skills & Experience
Strong experience designing and developing software using C
Proven expertise with NI LabWindows/CVI
Familiarity with NI TestStand
Experience working in test engineering or test system software environments
Desirable Skills & Experience
Development of low-level software drivers
Software development for automated or complex test systems
Experience working within a structured development process framework
Agile development experience and use of modern collaboration/tooling platforms
Familiarity with configuration management, defect tracking, and peer review practices
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