GIS Terrain Specialist

MAK Technologies•Cambridge, MA

1d•Onsite

About The Position

Who YOU are and what You can become: Do you love pushing the limits of 3D graphics to create immersive worlds? We’re looking for a dynamic, hands-on GIS/Terrain specialist who thrives on building rich, complex virtual environments for training and simulation. You’ll grow into a key technical voice shaping how our global virtual world is built, expanded, and delivered. On-site work is mandatory for this position – Candidates will be required to be in the office in Cambridge, Massachusetts, a minimum of three days a week. Who WE are and where WE are going: MAK Technologies (MAK) develops commercial off-the-shelf 3D modelling, training, and simulation software that helps users link, simulate, and visualize their world. MAK’s primary users are in the aerospace, defense, and transportation industries, yet its products and services can help customers anywhere modelling and simulation is needed to train, plan, analyze, experiment, prototype, and demonstrate. MAK’s customers include the top ten defense integrators in the world, along with hundreds of companies in Defense, Air Traffic Management, Command & Control, and Homeland Security. MAK also develops training solutions for the United States and international militaries to address both individual and collective training. MAK is dedicated to serving its customers by building flexible products, offering superior technical support, and innovating new ways to enhance readiness through uniquely tailored training solutions. What YOU will do: Our product line allows users to operate in a completely virtual world. That world is procedurally built from highly stylized GIS data sources that cover the entire planet. You will be responsible for curating, expanding, and maintaining that world. You will work with MAK’s engineering team to oversee upgrades and management of our virtual world server, VR-TheWorld Server. You will test new server releases, validate data, and help deliver server upgrades to our customer base. You will work with artists and 3D modelers on the MAK Art and Content team to build out new cities and areas, create maps, and process various GIS data to meet simulation and performance needs.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in GIS, Game Development, 3D Art Production, or a related field, or equivalent hands-on experience working with complex distributed games and virtual environments.
Strong grasp of 3D terrain modeling.
Deep understanding of common GIS formats and tools used to process geospatial data.
Curious, dynamic mindset; someone who enjoys experimenting, exploring, and stress-testing distributed systems.
Excellent communication skills.

Nice To Haves

Knowledge of web servers and software container systems used for deploying web services.
Experience with 3D modelling for game environments.
Basic JavaScript and XML experience
General understanding of software design and development.

Responsibilities

Oversee acquisition, licensing, and compliance for geospatial datasets used in simulation environments, including raster imagery, elevation models, and vector feature data.
Manage end-to-end workflows for downloading, validating, standardizing, and maintaining geospatial data from diverse sources (e.g., national mapping agencies, satellite providers, open geospatial repositories).
Coordinate data preparation pipelines, including projection management, tiling, metadata generation, and adherence to internal and customer geospatial standards.
Direct hosting, configuration, and performance monitoring of terrain server environments to ensure reliable delivery of large-scale raster and vector datasets.
Collaborate with engineering teams to define terrain data requirements and support integration with simulation products and customer-specific terrain formats.
Manage preparation, optimization, and integration of multiple terrain formats—including GeoTIFF, DTED, DEM, Cesium 3D Tiles, Quantized Mesh, and OSGEarth terrain packages—to support diverse simulation and visualization workflows.
Manage the setup, delivery, and operational reliability of tile-based geospatial web services—including WMS, WMTS, and XYZ—to support streaming terrain data for internal systems and customer-facing solutions.
Work with engineering to develop, produce, and deploy VR-TheWorld Server upgrades.
Work with customers to educate them on the best ways to process their data.
Work with the documentation team to update materials associated with custom data curation.