GNC Orbit Controls Engineer

Xona Space Systems • Burlingame, CA

112d

About The Position

Xona is the navigational intelligence company bringing real-time, centimeter-level certainty to any device, anywhere on Earth. With Pulsar – the world’s most advanced PNT satellite infrastructure in Low Earth Orbit – Xona will offer a future-proof, backwards-compatible global positioning system optimized for absolute precision, superior power, and robust protection. We're looking for a GNC Orbit Controls Engineer to design and implement the algorithms and onboard software that handle orbit determination, guidance, maneuver execution, and post-maneuver analysis to deliver safe, efficient, and highly automated station-keeping and disposal. We’re building the software that keeps our spacecraft exactly where they need to be.

Requirements

• Strong in orbital mechanics and simulation with experience implementing onboard propagators with perturbation models and integrators on flight targets
• Experience building production guidance, control, or navigation software in C and C++, and using MATLAB and Simulink for analysis, modeling, and test-vector generation
• Experience designing RAAN and LTAN control strategies in open-loop and closed-loop forms and validating them in high-fidelity sims or flight
• Experience executing or supporting real maneuvers and reconciling plan versus truth with post-burn estimation
• Comfortable at the ADCS and propulsion interface for burn pointing and momentum management

Nice To Haves

• Master’s or Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering, Control Systems, Applied Physics, or a related field
• Hands-on electric propulsion experience including thrust modeling and calibration, long-burn guidance, duty-cycle planning, and thermal constraints
• Experience with orbit propagation algorithms
• Trajectory design and optimization expertise
• Emphasis on code quality and reliability with unit and integration testing, SIL and HIL, and experience on embedded RTOS or embedded Linux targets
• Familiarity with CCSDS ephemeris and attitude formats

Responsibilities

• Develop open-loop and closed-loop controllers for RAAN and LTAN control, altitude management, station-keeping, and end-of-life disposal
• Implement and maintain onboard orbit propagators, select and validate integrators, and ensure numerical consistency with ground truth
• Build and validate orbit determination pipelines using EKF or UKF with GNSS, and manage navigation readiness and covariance gating for maneuvers
• Design burns and long-arc trajectories, and optimize delta V and timelines under comm visibility, power and thermal, and operations constraints
• Plan and execute electric-propulsion long burns, including throttle profile generation, power and duty-cycle scheduling, thermal considerations, ignition and re-ignition logic, progress monitoring, and correction strategies
• Coordinate burn pointing and wheel momentum strategy with ADCS
• Maintain numerically consistent MATLAB and C++ simulators, create Monte Carlo campaigns, run SIL and HIL tests, and perform post-maneuver reconstruction

Benefits

• Diversity and inclusion commitment

What This Job Offers

• Number of Employees: 51-100 employees