Senior Battery Systems Engineer

Relativity Space•Long Beach, CA

About The Position

Relativity Space is hiring a Senior Battery Systems Engineer to help develop Terran R’s high-voltage battery system and grow into technical ownership of it as a complete product. The role spans cell, mechanical, thermal, electrical/BMS, and vehicle integration disciplines. Initially, the engineer will work with experienced battery engineers to learn the current design and its history; over time, they will take on more of the system’s technical direction. The position links the battery’s mechanical and electrical disciplines with the rest of the vehicle and translates mission and vehicle needs into traceable requirements and a suitable architecture. It is a hands-on technical role with cross-functional influence and a potential path to technical leadership as the battery team grows. The engineer will define and maintain battery requirements, specifications, architecture, and interfaces; coordinate environmental, loads, BMS, packaging, and integration definitions; own battery safety and verification strategies; and manage technical program responsibilities across schedule, risk, dependencies, and status. They will also represent the battery effort in design and safety reviews, support suppliers and cell vendors, contribute to producibility and new product introduction, and lead root-cause and corrective-action work for anomalies.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in engineering (mechanical, electrical, aerospace, chemical, or related).
At least 5 years of battery systems development experience across the product lifecycle, from concept through design and qualification, including high-voltage lithium-ion packs.
Demonstrated ability to derive and own requirements top-down using rigorous trade studies and traceable specifications.
Working depth across cell selection and characterization, pack architecture, thermal management, BMS scope, and battery safety/abuse behavior.
Strong understanding of battery safety, failure modes, and high-voltage system fundamentals.
Proven cross-functional leadership and clear technical communication in fast-paced development environments.

Nice To Haves

Experience in aerospace, launch vehicles, automotive high-voltage systems, or another high-consequence, environment-driven domain.
Familiarity with environmental qualification, including vibration, shock, thermal-vacuum, and EMI/EMC testing, and test-as-you-fly verification.
Functional safety or hazard analysis background, such as FMEA, FTA, ISO 26262, or aerospace equivalents.
Experience with requirements and modeling tools such as DOORS, Jama, or Cameo/MBSE.
Hands-on cell characterization and abuse/destructive test experience.
Familiarity with charging/ground support equipment and ground operations.

Responsibilities

Partner with vehicle and power-system architecture teams to derive battery requirements from mission profiles, ConOps, and power-system needs.
Own and maintain the battery specification, including requirements, interfaces, verification criteria, and traceability.
Drive battery architecture and cell down-selection through documented trade studies in collaboration with mechanical, test, and BMS engineers.
Define and manage electrical, mechanical, thermal, and data interfaces between the battery and the vehicle.
Work with Flight Sciences, ConOps, and the Criteria team to define environmental and loads requirements, including vibration, shock, thermal environments, thermal cycling, EMI/EMC, altitude/vacuum, and mission duty cycles.
Partner with avionics/EE to define BMS requirements and scope, including cell monitoring, balancing, protection, contactor/heater control, state estimation, and fault management.
Coordinate with mechanical and vehicle-integration teams on packaging, mounting, thermal management, and installation interfaces.
Work with criteria and structures teams to close structural, thermal, and safety margins.
Own battery safety architecture, including thermal-runaway detection and propagation mitigation, venting/burst-disc strategy, physical cell protection, and hazard analysis.
Define cell- and pack-level verification and qualification strategies, including test-as-you-fly approaches and data systems for design feedback.
Lead FMEA/FTA, reliability analysis, and identification and mitigation of single points of failure.
Manage the battery effort’s technical program, including schedule, risk, dependencies, and status; serve as the organized point of communication for battery status across teams.
Represent the battery at vehicle design reviews, safety review boards, and cross-functional forums.
Support supplier and cell-vendor engagement, benchmarking, RFI/RFQ evaluation, and technical down-selection.
Contribute to producibility/DFM and NPI as the design matures.
Lead structured root-cause and corrective-action (RCCA) work for anomalies.