Optical Engineering Manager, TeraWave Optical Payloads
About The Position
This role is part of TeraWave, Blue Origin’s satellite communications network. TeraWave optical payloads include Optical Inter-Satellite Link (OISL) terminals that carry data across the constellation and connect it to the ground. Each terminal combines an off-axis telescope, fine steering and tracking optics, and fiber-coupled transmit and receive paths. The terminals must maintain tight wavefront, pointing, and coupling budgets across the on-orbit thermal environment and be designed for production at constellation scale. The Optical Engineering Manager leads the optical design team in Development Labs and owns the terminal optical design, from the telescope through the back-end optics to the fiber, including error budgets linked to system performance. The team works with opto-mechanical, thermal, PAT, test, and supply chain engineers to close budgets and release designs that can be built and aligned at rate. This is a hands-on technical leadership role, combining people management with in-depth design review, technical trade decisions, and presentation and defense of those decisions in program reviews. The position requires on-site work in Redmond, Washington, with occasional travel to suppliers and to Hutto, Texas, to support production transfer.
Requirements
- Bachelor’s degree in Optics, Physics, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
- At least 6 years of hands-on experience in optical design and development of precision optical systems, from requirements through hardware build and verification.
- At least 2 years of experience leading engineering teams, including hiring and directing engineers’ work, as a people manager or technical lead accountable for team delivery.
- Proficiency with optical design and analysis tools such as Code V, Zemax OpticStudio, or FRED, including tolerancing and stray-light analysis.
- Experience with athermal optical design and integrated structural-thermal-optical analysis.
- Experience taking optical designs through qualification or design verification and transfer to manufacturing.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to present and defend design trades to senior technical and program leadership.
- Must be a U.S. citizen or national, U.S. permanent resident (current Green Card holder), or lawfully admitted into the U.S. as a refugee or granted asylum.
Nice To Haves
- Master’s degree or PhD in Optics, Physics, Electrical Engineering, or a related field.
- Experience designing optics for spaceflight hardware, including radiation, vacuum, and launch-environment considerations.
- Experience with free-space laser communication terminals, inter-satellite links, or fiber-coupled free-space optical systems.
- Experience with pointing, acquisition, and tracking (PAT) optics, fast steering mirrors, and quad-cell or focal-plane tracking sensors.
- Experience with reflective telescope design and diamond-turned optics.
- Experience with wavefront metrology, interferometry, and model-to-test correlation.
- Experience transferring optical designs to high-volume or contract manufacturing, including assembly, alignment, and quality-control procedures.
- Demonstrated experience with or strong interest in using automation or AI tools to improve design and analysis productivity.
Responsibilities
- Manage engineers, including recruiting, hiring, onboarding, mentoring, performance evaluation, and career development.
- Own the optical design of TeraWave optical payloads, including the front-end telescope, back-end optical assembly, fine steering and tracking optics, camera and detector optics, and transmit and receive fiber coupling.
- Own and manage optical error budgets for wavefront error, boresight and pointing, coupling efficiency, and optical throughput; decompose them into component and subassembly specifications.
- Lead tolerance, sensitivity, stray-light, and polarization analyses, and drive athermal design with structural-thermal-optical (STOP) analysis in partnership with opto-mechanical and thermal engineering.
- Lead optical design reviews and release optical prescriptions, drawings, coating specifications, and interface documents through EVT, DVT, and production.
- Design for manufacturability, alignment, and test so optical designs can be fabricated, aligned, and verified at constellation production rates.
- Work with optical suppliers on fabrication and coating, including diamond-turned mirrors, dichroics, and narrowband filters; support supplier selection, capability assessment, and corrective action.
- Partner with the optical test team to define verification methods and acceptance criteria, and use test data to correlate models and close design margins.
- Lead root-cause analysis of optical performance issues and drive validated design corrective actions.
- Support optical architecture trades for future payloads and link-rate upgrades, including space-to-ground optical links.
- Scope, assign, and track team work so members have clear, prioritized workloads and milestones are met.
- Drive technical rigor through design-review discipline, model configuration management, and traceable analysis.
Benefits
- Medical insurance
- Dental insurance
- Vision insurance
- Basic and supplemental life insurance
- Paid parental leave
- Short- and long-term disability
- 401(k) with company match of up to 5%
- Education Support Program
- Stock options for regular employees working at least 20 hours per week
- Paid time off of up to four weeks per year based on weekly scheduled hours
- Up to 14 company-paid holidays
- Depending on role type and job level, possible benefits and bonuses based on individual contributions and other factors; amounts and eligibility are not guaranteed
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Manager
