Anduril Interns: Building core tech for 21st century defense
They’re not doing ‘busy work’ — They're building the future of American and Allied defense.
As Kimberly Johnson was thinking about life after the U.S. Army, she became intrigued by user experience and design.
“It ticked all my boxes,” Johnson said of the field, which designs software to be efficient and easy to use. It was multidisciplinary and required a diverse skill set. So she applied her GI Bill to attend the University of Washington for a Masters in Human-Centered Design and Engineering. And her military and academic track record has undoubtedly served her well as a graduate intern at Anduril Industries, where she has put both experiences into practice.
Each year, Anduril offers paid technical and non-technical internships for students in undergraduate and graduate programs — and each is assigned meaningful projects with real-world impact while gaining exposure to various engineering disciplines. They also participate in onboarding training and work alongside full-time employees, are paid competitive salaries, and participate in exclusive intern events ranging from team-building summer barbecues and boat rides to dinner at the home of Anduril Founder Palmer Luckey.
“Interns at Anduril don’t do small projects or take on ‘busy work,’” says Gokul Subramanian, Senior Vice President of Engineering (Software Programs). “As a young company, we need all hands on deck! And this year’s class worked on some of our most critical projects while receiving direct mentorship and on-the-job training from our senior engineering mentors. Many interns also receive a security clearance which enables them to interface directly with DoD customers and contribute to our nation’s hardest problems.”
Johnson, who piloted Black Hawk helicopters for two decades before retiring from the Army in 2022, was one of about 100 interns in Anduril’s 2023 class. Though she was initially concerned about fitting in with younger interns, Johnson was “pleasantly surprised” at the friendly, collaborative, and mission-focused culture of Anduril. It was different from what she was used to in the military, with open sharing of feedback between colleagues deemed far more important than formalities and rank structure that can sometimes hinder collaboration.
“The culture is really supportive of people trying new things,” she said.
At Anduril, Johnson spent most of her time conducting research into how operators use the Lattice software platform to streamline the launch, flight, and landing of ALTIUS launched effects for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions. It was a big project, and one with tangible impact: Her research and designs will soon be handed off to engineers to code a better Lattice user experience for autonomous system operators and commanders alike.
“It’s been nice to apply what I’m learning academically,” Johnson said. “I’ve gotten confirmation that what I’m learning in grad school is helpful.”
Designing apps and websites for a positive user experience is especially important for national security as the Pentagon increasingly shifts its focus from legacy capability to software-enabled hardware. The more complex and unfriendly the interface, the longer it takes users to get what they need — a potentially serious issue, especially in time-critical situations such as targeting and coordinating fires. Johnson remembered a time early on in her Army career as a personnel recovery officer having to maintain a database of soldiers’ information, which had everything one needed to know about a missing soldier — photo, contact info, identity-verification questions — but could query only one record at a time, solely by social security number. The developers “totally left out the user” while designing the software, she said, so she had to manually look up each soldier’s individual file to ensure their information was correct instead of quickly gathering a roster of the hundreds of soldiers under her charge to identify gaps in the data.
For Michael “Misha” Khmelkov, a senior at The University of Southern California majoring in biochemistry and minoring in computer science, interning at Anduril was a positive experience that boosted his confidence and helped him learn a great deal from colleagues on the Mission Systems Engineering team.
“I have a lot of independence and autonomy in my work,” he said, noting that Anduril interns are given clear guidance and allowed flexibility in how they solve problems. “It built my confidence a lot.” Indeed, within Khmelkov’s first month, he had written code that was deployed for use at a testing event of Anduril’s counter-unmanned aerial systems (UAS) technology.
While studying at Carnegie-Mellon University, Lauren Park helped design a mission control interface for “MoonRanger,” a suitcase-size robot funded by NASA to search for ice on the lunar surface. That got her interested in space and national defense, and eventually led her to joining Anduril on its mission to transform allied military capability and bring much-needed reform to an outdated defense industry ecosystem. “I think Anduril’s mission is really cool. And it stands out from other defense companies.”
Park was excited to gain hands-on experience at Anduril, and happy to take on various projects of real significance. That wasn’t always the case on prior internships, she said, with vaguely-described pursuits and small-scope assignments that seemed like busy work.
“Anduril focuses on providing autonomy to interns,” Park said. “You have ownership over whatever project or product you are working on.”
Park’s main project at Anduril was designing an intuitive user experience for operators of autonomous assets. Whether an asset is flying through the air or diving underwater, operators need to run a series of checks before launch to ensure the hardware and software is working as intended. Some assets may require lengthy pre-flight procedures, while others may need to be completed in a certain order. But “having a more systematic way of doing things” in Lattice, she says, “is a huge step in tying everything together.”
Albert Wang, an intern on the Counter-UAS team heading into his final year studying computer science at The University of Pennsylvania, enjoyed working at Anduril and in his off time, traveling around southern California with fellow interns. The culture, he said, is “the embodiment of work hard, play hard.” And Wang put in serious effort over the summer to streamline an important analysis tool for operators to understand aerial threats, offering data and statistics for observed “tracks” of drones and other aircraft.
“I have learned so much in just three months and feel like I’ve become a much better software engineer,” he said.
In the end, Anduril interns helped further development on the core technologies Anduril is pioneering for 21st century defense, and delivered on important projects including propulsion system testing, autonomous land vehicle design, electrical board design, and phased array antenna development, among others. And just like their mentors in the full-time ranks, Anduril interns took ownership and great pride in delivering transformational capability to American and Allied warfighters.
“It feels like everyone at Anduril is here for a reason,” Khmelkov said. “It’s not just a job. They’re here because they’re passionate about Anduril’s work.”
ANDURIL INDUSTRIES is a defense technology company with a mission to transform U.S. and allied military capabilities with advanced technology. By bringing the expertise, technology, and business model of the 21st century’s most innovative companies to the defense industry, Anduril is changing how military systems are designed, built and sold. As the world enters a new era of strategic competition, Anduril is committed to bringing cutting-edge AI, computer vision, sensor fusion, and networking technology to the military in months, not years.
