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Electric Propulsion Engineer, Avionics (Starshield)

SpaceX· Starshield Satellite Engineering
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Hawthorne, CA$105k - $170kFull-timePosted 3w ago

About the role

Electric Propulsion Engineer (avionics focus) to design, analyze, build, and test high-volume, flight-qualified satellite electric propulsion systems and propulsion power-processing/control electronics for Starshield missions.

Responsibilities

  • Design, analyze, test, and provide operational support for high-volume production spacecraft electric propulsion avionics (power-processing and control electronics that drive thrusters, heaters, and propellant-feed actuators)
  • Lead or contribute to electrical architecture, specification, component selection, circuit-board design, implementation, verification, board bring-up, and debugging
  • Design, develop, and test propulsion electronics, including characterization, requirements generation and verification, and flight qualification
  • Partner with firmware/software, mechanical, thermal, manufacturing, and production-test teams
  • Design, build, modify, operate, and troubleshoot electric propulsion electronics and associated test setups, including vacuum-chamber electrical interfaces, high-voltage supplies, data acquisition and control systems, harnessing, and instrumentation
  • Analyze and review ground-test and flight data with numerical tools (e.g., Python, MATLAB) to confirm hardware is operating as expected and inform design decisions; develop scripts as needed
  • Lead root-cause investigations and board or component redesigns to improve reliability and/or production rates
  • Develop and execute qualification test plans for flight readiness (vibration, shock, thermal cycle, EMI/EMC, life cycle, fault injection)
  • Evaluate design and qualification coverage for new vehicles and missions; close gaps with targeted analysis or test
  • Make risk-informed trades across cost, lead time, reliability, and performance to meet program reliability targets for flight hardware
  • Own critical spaceflight hardware end-to-end, with support from manufacturing, reliability, test, firmware, and operations teams
  • Work as an integrated team, with daily interactions among technicians, engineers, and managers; identify and implement design and process improvements
  • Communicate clearly under ambiguity, escalate technical and schedule risks early, and collaborate through disagreement

Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree in electrical, aerospace, physics, mechanical, or other engineering discipline preferred
  • 1+ years of total experience in one or a combination of: designing, testing, and analyzing power electronics, analog/mixed-signal, or spacecraft avionics; academic research with comparable design/build/test ownership of power supplies, plasma or electric-propulsion power processing, high-voltage, or control electronics; or closely related hardware experience

Skills

Required:Power electronics designAnalog/mixed-signal design and debugPython, MATLAB
Nice to have:Circuit-board designVacuum / high-voltage test experience

Benefits

  • Comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage
  • 401(k) retirement plan
  • short and long-term disability insurance
  • life insurance
  • paid parental leave
  • 3 weeks of paid vacation and 10+ paid holidays per year
  • paid sick leave policy
  • stock or long-term incentives; potential discretionary bonuses; Employee Stock Purchase Plan
  • access to discounts and other perks
  • 10% clearance differential if active clearance (up to $20,000)
Last updated Sep 30, 2026. Interested? Apply on the company site.

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