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Salary: USD 122,000 - 182,000 / annual
Relativity Space is building rockets and advanced manufacturing capabilities to serve aerospace, defense, and industrial sectors. Horizon Manufacturing Technologies, the company's externally facing advanced manufacturing business, is pioneering convergent manufacturing—integrating large-scale additive, subtractive, and inspection capabilities through an autonomous platform.
You will own the end-to-end bid process for complex manufacturing projects, leading RFQ/RFP responses from initial customer inquiry through technical feasibility assessment, cost estimation, risk evaluation, scheduling, and final proposal delivery. You'll build repeatable bidding systems and workflows that scale as the business grows, establishing structured approaches to cost estimating, technical feasibility reviews, and bid/no-bid decision frameworks.
Key responsibilities include:
- Owning the complete bid lifecycle and developing accurate cost and price models for additively manufactured parts, integrating material, labor, equipment utilization, post-processing, and risk factors
- Serving as a technical-commercial translator: evaluating customer designs for manufacturability, identifying geometric and material limitations, and working with engineering to develop alternative approaches when requirements push capability boundaries
- Supporting the entire sales cycle by partnering with Business Development Managers on customer meetings, technical presentations, and contract negotiations
- Driving cost estimation and pricing discipline across the organization
- Orchestrating alignment across engineering, operations, and commercial teams without formal authority
You'll work alongside welders, robotics engineers, data scientists, and systems engineers at the intersection of hardware and software, creating an end-to-end convergent manufacturing platform serving aerospace, defense, marine, energy, and nuclear sectors.
REQUIREMENTS:
- 5+ years in technical bidding, sales engineering, or application engineering within contract manufacturing, additive manufacturing, metal fabrication, or job shop environments
- Strong technical foundation with hands-on manufacturing knowledge: ability to interpret complex engineering documents, understand metal manufacturing processes (welding, machining, heat treatment, post-processing), assess DFM considerations, and translate customer requirements into internal technical requirements for accurate quoting
- Structured process builder and excellent communicator: ability to build systems (templates, workflows, qualification criteria) that make bidding repeatable and present confidently to executives, engineers, and procurement teams
- Cross-functional orchestrator: ability to drive alignment across teams without formal authority, balancing technical feasibility, competitive pricing, and realistic schedules
- Scrappy and entrepreneurial mindset: comfortable with ambiguity, willing to wear multiple hats, energized by building something new
NICE TO HAVES:
- Experience with Wire Arc Direct Energy Deposition (DED) or large-scale additive manufacturing with metal 3D printing technologies
- Manufacturing engineering, welding, or metallurgy background with hands-on fabrication experience
- Defense or aerospace contract manufacturing background including experience with CUI, DFARS, ITAR, AS9100, or selling into primes and government customers
- Early-stage or startup manufacturing experience where you built bidding/estimating processes in resource-constrained, high-growth environments
