Senior Communications Systems Engineer

CHAOS Industries•El Segundo, CA

30d•$110,000 - $151,000•Onsite

About The Position

CHAOS Industries is hiring a Senior Communications Systems Engineer to own the connectivity backbone of its fielded systems, including 5G/cellular, satellite communications such as Starlink, point-to-point wireless, and tactical mesh radios. The engineer will apply systems engineering practices across communications solutions, including defining traceable requirements, architectures and interfaces, trade studies, and verification from factory testing through field deployment. The role ensures connectivity solutions are selected, qualified, validated, and ready for deployment. The engineer will also monitor commercial and tactical communications developments—including new radios, waveforms, multi-orbit satellite constellations, and software-defined networking—and advance promising technologies into the product baseline. The position is full-time and onsite at CHAOS Industries’ office in El Segundo, California, with occasional travel to deployment sites.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, Systems Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
At least 7 years of systems engineering experience supporting SATCOM, wireless communications, tactical networking, or connectivity products.
Experience developing, managing, and verifying system, subsystem, and interface requirements throughout the product lifecycle.
Working knowledge of SATCOM and RF communications systems, including satellite link analysis, antenna systems, and modem/RF chain fundamentals.
Working knowledge of cellular technologies and international band plans, including LTE/5G NR, and practical experience with satellite internet terminals such as Starlink.
Strong understanding of IP networking concepts, including routing, switching, network protocols, VPNs, failover, and connectivity architectures.
Experience performing RF link budget analysis, antenna placement optimization, and line-of-sight/non-line-of-sight analysis in complex terrain.
Experience developing hardware test procedures and pass/fail criteria for production or integration environments.
Experience collaborating with customers, suppliers, and cross-functional engineering teams on complex technical programs.
Excellent problem-solving skills and a bias toward root cause over workaround.

Nice To Haves

Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, Systems Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
Experience with tactical mesh radios such as MPU5/Wave Relay and 60 GHz/5 GHz point-to-point systems.
Familiarity with multi-orbit constellations (LEO/MEO/GEO), beam or satellite handover, and ground network integration.
Experience designing or integrating secure communications architectures, including authentication, encryption, VPNs, certificate management, and secure remote connectivity.
Experience analyzing communications performance in contested, degraded, or denied environments, including multipath, interference, jamming, and dynamic network topology.
Experience with requirements management, Application Lifecycle Management (ALM), and/or Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) tools such as Cameo, including multi-level requirements sets and traceability.
Familiarity with export control and supply-chain compliance considerations for communications hardware, such as country-of-origin restrictions.
Scripting experience for test automation and network validation using Python or Bash.
INCOSE certification or demonstrated application of systems engineering best practices.
Experience in a rapid-iteration hardware production environment.
Experience supporting international deployments of communications equipment, including regional regulatory and spectrum considerations.
Active or eligible U.S. security clearance.

Responsibilities

Translate mission, customer, and business needs into verifiable, traceable system and subsystem connectivity requirements.
Develop and maintain connectivity architectures, interfaces, design descriptions, and interface control documents across cellular/5G, SATCOM, point-to-point wireless, and tactical mesh networks.
Perform design analysis and verification, including RF link budgets, key performance parameters, antenna placement and pointing, handover behavior, and regulatory compliance.
Lead trade studies weighing performance, size, weight, power, cost, availability, and compliance, including future needs such as non-line-of-sight links, elevated relays, and GPS-denied synchronization.
Evaluate, select, and qualify communications hardware for field robustness and regional compatibility, verifying RF bands, regulatory suitability, and export/AT compliance before purchase or product-baseline inclusion.
Manage regional hardware variants in the product bill of materials.
Collaborate with suppliers, satellite operators, and service providers to develop and integrate connectivity solutions.
Integrate communications equipment into factory test plans with clear pass/fail criteria and establish pre-shipment verification on representative system hardware using in-country SIMs and bands.
Support system integration, troubleshooting, and root-cause analysis from the lab through field deployment, and drive corrective actions into the product baseline.
Participate in technical reviews and work with product scrums to verify baseline compatibility.
Own the tested connectivity matrix across deployment countries, including cellular bands, SATCOM legality and plans, spectrum constraints, and validated fallbacks, as well as configuration baselines and runbooks for communications peripherals.
Partner with FDE, Mission, and IT on deployment connectivity planning and documentation.
Provide reach-back support to deployed teams during international demonstrations and operations, with occasional travel to deployment sites.
Monitor emerging communications technologies and drive promising options into the product baseline.