Software Engineer - Robotics & Autonomous Systems - Applied Mathematics
I'm a Software Engineer I at Dell Technologies with a strong background in computer science, applied mathematics, and robotics. I graduated from Texas State University (Dec 2024) with a B.S. in Computer Science and a B.S. in Applied Mathematics.
My interests are in software engineering and autonomy, particularly robotics, drones, and intelligent infrastructure. I enjoy working closely with hardware and embedded systems, and I’m equally comfortable building full-stack applications, tooling, and large-scale automation.
I'm especially passionate about:
- Autonomous drones and robots
- Applied ML & computer vision
- Embedded systems
- Turning research prototypes into production ready software
Software Engineer I - Dell Technologies
February 2025 - Present
CTO & Co-Founder - Firefly Robotics September 2024 - Present
Software Engineer Intern - Dell Technologies May 2024 - August 2024
Drone Engineer - High Performance Engineering Lab (HiPE) January 2024 - Dec 2024
NSF REU Robotics Researcher - High Performance Engineering Lab (HiPE) June 2022 - January 2023
Languages: C++, Python, Java, Bash, MATLAB, MIPS
Robotics & ML: ROS, MAVLink, DroneKit, OpenCV, PyMavLink, NumPy, Pandas, SciPy, TensorFlow, PyTorch
Systems & Cloud: Linux, Git, Docker, AWS, Azure, boto3, Jenkins
Web & Tooling: Flask, React, Node.js, Express, PostgreSQL, HTML/CSS
- A. Rafiq, et al., “Design of Autonomous Rover for Firefighter Rescue: Integrating Deep Learning with ROS2”, 2024 IEEE World AI IoT Congress (AIIoT), Seattle, WA, USA, 2024, pp. 421-428, doi: 10.1109/AIIoT61789.2024.10578950.
- A. Rafiq, et al., “Saving lives while reducing first responder risks - with AI”, [White Paper] Dell Technologies, 2023. https://workstationguides.com/briefs/texasstateuniversity/
Portfolio: https://rafiqsaad.com
Email: [email protected]