Hardware Systems Lead, Drone
About The Position
As Hardware Systems Lead for the drone program, you will serve as the hands-on chief engineer for hardware that carries Applied Intuition’s autonomy into the air. You will understand and own the full mechanical and electrical system, architecting, building, testing, and improving hardware for survivability and reliability in flight. You will work closely with autonomy, software, and flight test teams to get aircraft flying, and your decisions will shape hardware performance under wind, vibration, shock, temperature swings, and moisture. The role owns end-to-end hardware architecture for drone platforms and includes hands-on prototyping, building, integration, debugging, and testing on real aircraft. It also involves defining hardware requirements and reference architectures, making size, weight, and power tradeoffs, leading technical decisions and design reviews, setting engineering standards, mentoring engineers, and supporting flight test campaigns, demonstrations, and field operations.
Requirements
- BS/MS in Aerospace, Mechanical, Electrical, Mechatronics, or a related field.
- 10+ years of hands-on hardware engineering experience on drones, UAS, or other aircraft.
- Strong command of the full hardware system, including airframes and structures, electrical architecture, power distribution, harness design, avionics, and their interactions.
- Track record designing hardware for demanding environments, with experience in vibration, shock, ingress protection, thermal management, and EMI/EMC.
- Hands-on lab and field experience building prototypes, wiring and debugging systems, running flight tests, and diagnosing failures and crashes.
- Experience integrating sensors such as cameras, lidar, radar, and GNSS/IMU, as well as compute and flight control hardware, onto airborne platforms.
- Experience with SWaP optimization and lightweight design, including composites and carbon fiber.
- Experience with reliability and qualification testing, including environmental testing, HALT, and flight-hour tracking.
- Systems-level thinking and ability to make and defend architecture decisions.
- Experience designing for manufacturability and field serviceability.
Nice To Haves
- Experience with fixed-wing, multirotor, or VTOL platforms.
- Familiarity with aerospace standards such as DO-160, MIL-STD-810, and MIL-STD-461.
- Experience with propulsion, battery, or power system integration.
Responsibilities
- Own end-to-end mechanical and electrical hardware architecture for drone platforms.
- Prototype, build, integrate, debug, and test hardware on real aircraft.
- Define and drive hardware survivability across vibration, shock, hard landings, thermal extremes, dust, water ingress, and EMI.
- Lead integration of cameras, lidar, radar, GNSS/IMU, compute, power systems, communications, and flight controllers onto airframes.
- Own size, weight, and power tradeoffs balancing performance, flight time, payload capacity, and cost.
- Define hardware requirements and reference architectures that scale across aircraft configurations.
- Plan and run environmental, durability, and flight testing; analyze failures and crashes; determine root causes and drive design fixes.
- Serve as the technical authority and escalation point for hardware tradeoffs across mechanical, electrical, avionics, software, autonomy, and flight test.
- Lead hardware design reviews, set engineering standards, and mentor other engineers.
- Support flight test campaigns, demonstrations, and field operations.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Senior
