Senior Space Avionics Hardware Development Engineer

Varda Space Industries•El Segundo, CA

1d•$140,333 - $202,703•Onsite

About The Position

Varda is hiring a Senior Space Avionics Hardware Development Engineer to design and deliver flight-critical electrical hardware for its satellite bus, reentry vehicle, and customer payloads. The engineer owns a hardware domain from schematic capture through flight qualification, defining subsystem requirements from mission and company objectives, designing to those requirements, and verifying that manufactured systems meet them. The role also involves defining safe operating criteria and supporting mission operations in assessing risks when operating near those criteria. Varda emphasizes rigorous hardware testing, stressing components beyond anticipated flight conditions and thoroughly investigating failures. The position is on-site in El Segundo, California. The stated salary range is $140,333–$202,703 per year. The role is eligible for long-term incentives in the form of stock options and/or long-term cash awards. Due to access to export-controlled items, Varda’s policy is to hire U.S. persons permitted to access its technology without an export license.

Requirements

Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related engineering discipline.
At least 5 years of direct electronics hardware design experience—including schematic capture, PCB layout, board bring-up, and environmental qualification—in aerospace, automotive, or another high-reliability industry.
Demonstrated experience contributing to complex electronics systems from design through production or deployment.
Advanced PCB design expertise and knowledge of high-speed signal integrity, power and grounding, and electromagnetic compatibility.
Experience taking complex PCB designs through fabrication and assembly.
Expertise using Altium and/or KiCad EDA suites.
Strong hands-on laboratory experience with electronic test equipment, including oscilloscopes, function generators, benchtop digital multimeters, and power supplies.
Experience programming in Python, MATLAB, or another scripting or data-analysis language.
Demonstrated experience implementing the hardware layer of multiple on-board and over-harness communication protocols, such as SPI, RS-422, and 1000BASE-T.
Experience designing analog and digital filtering and mixed-signal circuits.
Power electronics design experience, including load switches and switch-mode DC:DC converters.
Must qualify as a U.S. person permitted to access the company’s export-controlled technology without an export license, under the employer’s stated hiring policy.

Nice To Haves

Industry-leading electronic circuit design and analysis skills.
Strong supporting general knowledge of physics, mathematics, and chemistry fundamentals for designing electronics that experience unique environments.
Understanding of aerospace sensor and actuator technologies, including RTDs, pressure transducers, brushless motors, solenoid valves, thermocouples, stepper motors, and rotary or linear encoders.

Responsibilities

Design PCB-level electronics throughout the lifecycle, including schematic capture, layout, design validation, fabrication and assembly, and manufacturing test.
Support avionics architecture trade studies, analyses, performance characterization and specification, device selection, and roadmap direction.
Serve as an avionics subject matter expert for satellite, reentry vehicle, and payload hardware, supporting the GNC, pharmaceutical, mission operations, and integration teams.
Collaborate with flight software, thermal, GNC, structures, and other cross-functional teams to assess vehicle-wide impacts of design decisions.
Own product acceptance and qualification testing for space environments, including thermal, vibration, shock, TVAC, and EMI, with support from the Avionics Test team.
Provide direction on system-level integration test plans to verify hardware performance at the vehicle level.
Perform root cause analysis on test failures and implement holistic strategies to mitigate flight risks.
Mentor junior engineers on projects, challenges, and design methodologies.