Robotics Tech Lead Manager, April 2022 - August 2025

Guardian Agriculture

Guardian Agriculture has been working to revolutionize the way we manage crop treatments to make them safe, more accurate, and more sustainable. Our unique heavy-lift drones outperform other spray drones on the market, and open to door to massive reductions in pesticide usage and crop treatment related injuries and fatalities.

The Robotics Team

I led and managed the Robotics Team at Guardian. Despite being a small team, we had broad range of responsibilities at Guardian. The list here is a summary, but is not fully inclusive.

Flight Stability - Propulsion system bring up, calibration, tuning, and controls all fell under our purview. Generally ensuring that the aircraft could take off and fly in a stable fashion.
Path Planning - Fully utilize payload in the target locations without exceeding any craft limitations (battery, thermal limits, safety zones, etc).
Flight and Spray Autonomy - Executing the created plans, performing the spray missions accurately and efficiently, and landing safely for the next mission.
Data Logging and Review - Critical for making continuous improvements and understanding when something went wrong
Testing and Validation - Automated and manual procedures to ensure the aircraft is safe for missions, especially after software updates.
Fallback Behaviours Alerts- Logic added for craft preservation in case safe thresholds are exceed.
Radio Comms - Communication between drone and ground station
Simulation - For expediting testing and devopment
Operations Support - Flying demos, development, and for customers, our fleet of drones was very active.

Robotics Tech Lead Manager

As Robotics Lead my day-to-day work varies significantly. From a high level I was responsible for turning product requirements into the necessary robotics work, creating and scoping those tickets. I worked heavily with other team leads and senior leadership to priotize work to build a living roadmap for robotics. With my team I created sprints and managed scrums, story-pointing, and sprint retros. I also triaged issues that were encountered in the field or by other teams to fit an required robotics work into the roadmap.

As a small team, no member was exempt from individual contributions either. Some of the my areas of focus included path planning, significant portions of the flight stack, simulation, and localization. I also did extensive on-site and online support for critical testing and customer demos.