RF/Microwave Design Engineer

Communications & Power Industries•State College, PA

About The Position

CPI Satcom & Antenna Technologies is seeking an experienced RF/Microwave Design Engineer to develop high-reliability satellite communications electronics and lead focused engineering development projects. This hands-on role combines direct RF hardware design, analysis, simulation, laboratory testing, and problem resolution with technical leadership of small, multidisciplinary product-development teams. The engineer translates requirements into practical development plans, coordinates contributors, drives technical decisions, manages risks, and remains accountable for the integrated design and overall technical result. The role emphasizes agility and measurable progress: moving quickly from requirements to models, experiments, and working hardware; breaking complex developments into manageable increments; and testing high-risk assumptions early. Engineers use RF simulation, electromagnetic modeling, scripting, data analysis, automated testing, and company-approved AI tools, while validating important results through engineering judgment, independent analysis, experiments, and physical measurements. CPI is a global manufacturer of electronic components and subsystems headquartered in Plano, Texas, with manufacturing locations in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia. Its products serve communications, defense, medical, industrial, and scientific markets. The company describes its workplace as dynamic, team-oriented, collaborative, inclusive, and respectful.

Requirements

B.S. or M.S. in Electrical Engineering or a closely related field.
At least five years of relevant RF or microwave engineering experience.
Demonstrated experience designing, building, testing, and improving RF or microwave circuitry.
Experience leading a technical development project, significant work package, or small multidisciplinary engineering team.
Ability to organize technical work, coordinate contributors, resolve problems, and drive development toward a measurable result.
Working knowledge of RF system cascade and performance-budget analysis.
Working knowledge of linear and nonlinear RF behavior.
Working knowledge of noise figure and gain analysis.
Working knowledge of transmission lines, impedance matching, and printed RF structures.
Working knowledge of microstrip and coplanar-waveguide design.
Working knowledge of RF PCB layout and construction.
Working knowledge of design for manufacturability.
Hands-on experience with RF test equipment such as vector network analyzers, spectrum analyzers, signal generators, power meters, and noise-figure measurement systems.
Ability to independently investigate engineering problems and turn analysis into practical hardware improvements.
Ability to clearly communicate requirements, priorities, decisions, risks, and technical results to technical and nontechnical stakeholders.
Strong technical documentation and organizational skills.
Excellent communication skills.
Willingness to collaborate, share knowledge, develop other team members, and continuously learn new tools and methods.

Responsibilities

Design and develop RF and microwave products, including solid-state power amplifiers, low-noise amplifiers, upconverters, downconverters, filters, matching networks, and other RF assemblies.
Translate customer and product requirements into architectures, performance budgets, block diagrams, interface definitions, and verification plans.
Evaluate RF components, semiconductor devices, materials, and circuit topologies.
Perform linear, nonlinear, noise, thermal, and system-level analyses.
Use RF circuit and electromagnetic simulation tools to predict and optimize performance.
Stay directly involved in analysis, laboratory testing, design decisions, and problem resolution.
Serve as technical lead for small, multidisciplinary product-development teams.
Establish the technical approach, development plan, responsibilities, priorities, milestones, and verification strategy.
Break complex projects into increments that produce measurable technical progress and organize early analyses, prototypes, or experiments to resolve high-risk assumptions.
Coordinate engineers, designers, technicians, manufacturing personnel, suppliers, and other contributors.
Drive timely technical decisions, maintain visibility of requirements, interfaces, dependencies, risks, decisions, and open issues, and address blocked work or unexpected results.
Communicate status, risks, resource needs, and recovery plans clearly and early.
Maintain accountability for the integrated design and overall technical result.
Support design reviews, customer discussions, supplier interactions, and transitions into manufacturing.
Use Python, MATLAB, or similar tools to automate calculations, analyze test data, compare alternatives, control test equipment, and document results.
Use company-approved AI tools to accelerate research, modeling, coding, troubleshooting, test-data analysis, planning, and technical documentation.
Review simulation, scripted, and AI-generated results critically; validate important results with independent calculations, trusted references, simulation comparisons, experiments, and measurements.
Promote reusable calculations, automated workflows, documented test methods, and knowledge sharing.
Work in short development cycles of modeling, building, measuring, learning, and improving.
Collaborate, share knowledge, develop other team members, and continue learning new tools and methods.