Principal Test Automation Engineer

Business Unit:

Cubic Transportation Systems

Company Details:

When you join Cubic, you become part of a company that creates and delivers technology solutions in transportation to make people’s lives easier by simplifying their daily journeys, and defense capabilities to help promote mission success and safety for those who serve their nation. Led by our talented teams around the world, Cubic is committed to solving global issues through innovation and service to our customers and partners.

We have a top-tier portfolio of businesses, including Cubic Transportation Systems (CTS) and Cubic Defense (CD). Explore more on Cubic.com.

Job Details:

We are looking for a visionary and hands-on Principal SDET to lead our test automation strategy and elevate our product quality to the next level. In this pivotal role, you will architect and build robust, scalable automation frameworks from the ground up. You will not only solve complex technical challenges but also mentor a talented team of engineers, shaping the future of quality engineering across multiple agile teams. If you are passionate about building world-class automation and driving a culture of quality, this is the perfect opportunity for you.

Key Responsibilities:

• Architect & Strategize: Lead the definition and implementation of our end-to-end test automation strategy, frameworks, and best practices.
• Framework Development: Architect, build, and maintain scalable and reusable automation frameworks for Mobile (iOS/Android), Web UI, API, and backend systems.
• Technical Leadership & Mentorship: Provide technical guidance and mentorship to QA engineers, fostering a culture of automation excellence and continuous improvement.
• Tool & Technology Evaluation: Actively research and recommend new tools, technologies, and processes to evolve and enhance our testing capabilities.
• Drive CI/CD/CT: Champion Continuous Integration, Continuous Delivery, and Continuous Testing (CI/CD/CT) initiatives, ensuring automation is seamlessly integrated into our DevOps pipelines (e.g., Jenkins, GitLab CI, Azure DevOps).
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Partner closely with developers, DevOps engineers, and product managers to ensure comprehensive test coverage and advocate for testability from the start of the development lifecycle.
• Quality Metrics & Reporting: Develop and analyze key quality metrics to provide meaningful reports on automation effectiveness, test coverage, and overall product quality.
• Problem Solving: Tackle complex technical challenges, identify gaps in test coverage, and engineer innovative solutions to improve our quality gates.

Qualifications & Experience (Must-Haves):

• Education: Bachelor's or Master’s degree in Computer Science Engineering, or a related technical field.
• Experience: 10+ years in software test automation, with demonstrated experience in a senior or lead SDET capacity.
• Programming Expertise: Expert-level programming skills in at least one object-oriented language (Java or Python preferred) and proficiency in a scripting language (JavaScript).
• Framework Architecture: Proven experience designing, building, and maintaining automation frameworks from scratch.
• Tool Proficiency: Deep, hands-on expertise with a variety of modern automation tools:
• UI/Mobile: Selenium, Cypress, Playwright, or Appium.
• API: REST Assured, Postman, or similar.
• Testing Frameworks: Pytest,TestNG, JUnit etc.
• CI/CD Mastery: Solid experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD pipelines using tools like Jenkins, GitLab, or Azure DevOps.
• Communication & Leadership: Exceptional communication, leadership, and analytical skills, with a proven ability to solve complex problems.

Bonus Points (Nice-to-Haves):

• Generative AI: Experience with GenAI/ML tools for testing (e.g., GitHub Copilot) is a significant plus.
• Performance Engineering: Experience with performance and load testing tools (e.g., JMeter, Gatling).
• Cloud Technologies: Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and containerization (Docker, Kubernetes).
• Security Testing: Exposure to basic security testing concepts and tools (e.g., OWASP ZAP).
• Certifications: ISTQB or related certifications are a plus.