Android OS Technical Lead

An employer is seeking an Android OS Technical Lead for a client in Austin, TX. The Android OS Technical Lead will provide hands-on technical leadership for the Android OS / platform engineering work within the client’s environment. Project Trinity brings Poly’s PolyApp to its target state on PolyOS 5.x, moving from the legacy PolyOS 4.x application on Android 11 to the new PolyOS 5.x application on Android 13. This individual will guide technical design, implementation approach, code quality, and integration decisions for the Insight Global Android engineers, while serving as the primary technical counterpart to Architecture and Video Engineering.

This individual will also serve as the second-in-line technical leader for the entire Android team, not just Project Trinity, helping offload technical decision-making and day-to-day leadership responsibilities from the current team lead. This is an Android OS and platform engineering role, not a conventional Android mobile application role. The work includes building Android services, service APIs, and callbacks through an AI-enabled SDLC, bringing PolyOS 5.x to feature parity with 4.x, re-enabling Zoom and Google Meet provider support on 5.x, supporting the standalone Poly Video (PV) application and its SDK, and integrating with the Poly video experience built by the customer through an agreed interface contract.

This position is best suited for a hands-on Android platform engineer who has grown into technical leadership while remaining deeply involved in code. The Android OS Technical Lead will be expected to act as a trusted second-in-command for the HP Android team, make sound technical decisions in a niche domain without escalating every call, communicate clearly with HP architects and engineers, and raise the technical capability of the broader Insight Global Android team.

Additional information on Ideal Candidate: The perfect candidate has led Android OS or AOSP-level work on dedicated devices, ideally collaboration, communications, or audio/video hardware, and can comfortably move between Android services, framework-level code, Rust and native integration, service API design, and SDK work. The candidate can confidently take ownership off a lead’s plate, is credible in front of architects, communicates trade-offs clearly, and can mentor engineers in both the U.S. and India without creating unnecessary process overhead.

• 7 to 10 years of software engineering experience, with significant hands-on Android OS / platform development experience * Hands-on Android OS / platform development experience (AOSP, Android framework, or system-level development); conventional Android mobile application development alone does not meet this requirement * Strong Java and Kotlin development skills, with basic knowledge of C++ and JNI for native-layer integration * Hands-on Rust development experience * Experience with Android middleware, system services, and inter-process communication (AIDL / Binder), including Android service implementation * Experience designing and building service APIs, callbacks, and listeners consumed by other applications or teams * Experience developing or maintaining SDKs, libraries, or APIs, including validating SDK-based integrations * Experience with software architecture, translating architecture direction and product requirements into technical designs and implementation plans * Working knowledge of web development * Experience developing unit tests (JUnit) and instrumentation tests (Android Test Framework, UI Automator), including validation of asynchronous workflows and state machines * Strong knowledge of object-oriented design, design patterns, data structures and algorithms, multithreading and concurrency, and memory management * Experience building Android OS images or platform components and working within AOSP build systems * Experience debugging at the platform level using adb, logcat, dumpsys, bugreports, and related diagnostic tooling, with strong root-cause analysis skills * Experience working on dedicated hardware, embedded, or purpose-built Android devices rather than consumer phone applications only * Experience with Git / GitHub, code review practices, and CI/CD tools such as Jenkins * Hands-on experience using AI-assisted development tools such as GitHub Copilot and MCP servers as part of an AI-enabled SDLC * Experience working in Agile / Scrum delivery teams * Experience serving as a technical lead or second-in-command for an Android or platform engineering team, with the ability to own technical decisions independently * Experience performing code reviews, setting engineering standards, and mentoring other engineers * Strong written and verbal communication skills, including communicating technical risk to non-technical stakeholders * Ability to work U.S. business hours and coordinate with India-based engineers Experience with Android 11 to Android 13 upgrades or other Android version migrations * Experience with Android framework, system services, and middleware layer development and validation * Experience with Android HAL (camera / audio), media frameworks, native services, or peripheral (USB / Bluetooth) hardware-software integration * Experience integrating and validating third-party SDKs and platform services * Experience with networking, audio/video, video conferencing, or communications devices and technologies * Experience with Microsoft Teams Rooms, Teams devices, Zoom Rooms, or Google Meet hardware integrations * Experience with Poly, Cisco, Logitech, Neat, Yealink, or similar enterprise collaboration endpoints * Experience with Android device management, enrollment, provisioning, or OTA update workflows * Experience with embedded Android and Linux-based embedded systems * Familiarity with test automation on physical device farms * Advanced C++ development experience * Experience leading distributed engineering teams across the United States and India * Experience defining or managing interface contracts between separately owned software components