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Varda Space Industries is building commercial space infrastructure, including in-orbit pharmaceutical processing systems and reentry capsules. The company designs and operates its W-Series vehicles end-to-end, from satellite buses to heat shields and processing payloads.
As a Senior Automation and Controls Engineer, you will design, build, and own sophisticated ground support equipment (GSE) and test systems that qualify spaceflight hardware for orbit. This includes propulsion test stands, environmental qualification chambers, and spacecraft-level integration testing infrastructure. You'll work with a modern tech stack featuring a custom PLC framework and Beckhoff EtherCAT tooling built in-house.
Key responsibilities include:
- Design and maintain test systems and GSE for flight hardware qualification and manufacturing operations
- Integrate with diverse external hardware: thermal vacuum chambers, ovens, chillers, pressure systems, data acquisition hardware, and precision instrumentation
- Develop and extend Varda's internal PLC framework and EtherCAT tooling
- Contribute to architecture decisions on real-time control implementation, evaluating PLC-based (TwinCAT 3) versus Linux-based approaches
- Build electrical cabinets and wire panels, owning systems end-to-end from design through commissioning
- Partner with propulsion, avionics, GNC, and manufacturing teams to deliver test infrastructure on aggressive timelines
- Champion sustainable engineering practices to enable team ramp-up and system reliability
You bring 5+ years of industry experience in test automation, controls, or industrial automation. You have hands-on experience integrating industrial hardware over protocols like EtherCAT, Modbus, or RS-232/485 serial. You're proficient with modern PLC ecosystems, ideally Beckhoff TwinCAT 3 with structured text (IEC 61131-3), or eager to develop deep expertise. You're comfortable across the full stack: writing control software, designing electrical panels, wiring cabinets, and debugging hardware. You thrive in fast-paced startup environments with shifting priorities and expect end-to-end ownership.
Preferred qualifications include strong intuition for PLC versus Python orchestration tradeoffs, experience with custom in-house control frameworks, advanced EtherCAT expertise (DC sync, ENI configuration, master implementation), production TwinCAT 3 experience, deterministic hard real-time control loop design (sub-millisecond cycle times), familiarity with time-series data tools (Grafana, InfluxDB), aerospace experience in spacecraft testing or GSE development, and environmental test experience (TVAC, thermal cycling).
Varda is headquartered in El Segundo, California, with offices and production facilities where vehicles, equipment, and materials are built, integrated, and tested. The company also has offices in Washington, DC and Huntsville, AL. Founded in January 2021 by Will Bruey and Delian Asparouhov, Varda is backed by leading investors including Khosla Ventures, Lux Capital, Founders Fund, and General Catalyst.
