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Salary: USD 177,000 - 246,000 / annual
Muon Space, a LEO satellite constellation provider founded in 2021, seeks a Staff Mission Lead Systems Engineer to join the Mission Execution team. This role bridges mission formulation and implementation, with responsibility for end-to-end technical success of complex Earth and climate intelligence missions.
In the formulation phase, you will partner with the Mission Architecture team to develop mission concepts, conduct architecture trade studies, and establish technical baselines for prospective missions and proposal responses. You will develop and maintain mission-level system models (architecture, requirements, interfaces, behavior) that serve as the authoritative technical baseline from study through implementation.
Once a mission you helped formulate enters implementation, you transition to Mission Lead Systems Engineer, becoming the ultimate technical authority for that mission. Key responsibilities include:
- Leading conceptualization, design, and development of your designated mission
- Driving critical cross-functional technical trades and decisions
- Tailoring and implementing the Muon mission design process for your mission while contributing to process refinement across all missions
- Translating customer objectives into clear, verifiable, actionable technical requirements
- Serving as primary technical point of contact for customers, partners, and internal stakeholders
- Managing requirements traceability, verification, and validation
- Defining mission CONOPS and managing subsystem budgets (power, data, mass, pointing/stability)
- Identifying and mitigating mission risks
- Coordinating design changes across disciplines
- Leading design, test readiness, and flight readiness reviews
- Monitoring on-orbit spacecraft and data pipelines
- Providing technical direction to systems, hardware, software, data, ground segment, and operations teams
- Contributing systems engineering expertise to other Muon missions as needed
- Improving engineering processes, tools, and methodologies
The role demands a "big-picture" view spanning the full mission lifecycle and requires the ability to right-size analysis and processes for different system maturity levels, flexibility with changing demands, and effective communication to diverse audiences. You will work in a lean, agile environment.
**Requirements:**
- Direct engineering experience with EO/IR and/or RF systems (payload/instrument design, link budget analysis, spectrum/regulatory considerations, mission-level architecture trades)
- B.S. or higher degree in engineering field with 8+ years of experience in complex system, mission architecture, and/or spacecraft design for high-rigor government and/or demanding commercial customers
- Demonstrated experience as a technical lead (Chief Engineer, Lead Systems Engineer) on at least one complex system design for USG, DoD, IC, or commercial customers
- Experience with major space programs for USG, DoD, IC, or commercial customers
- Experience with USG/IC acquisition programs, space systems development standards, and mission assurance standards
- Strong understanding of USG/IC contracts and their artifacts
- Experience supporting proposal development (RFI/RFP responses) for government contracts
- Extensive experience in system modeling, systems analysis, and running simulations
- Proven history of system integration and delivery of complex systems
- Experience in formal requirements management for multi-disciplinary projects
- Demonstrated project management skills and ability to collaborate across engineering disciplines
- Excellent communication, presentation, and coordination skills
- Ability to rapidly change roles/responsibilities in fast-paced environment
- Active TS/SCI security clearance required
**Nice-to-have skills:**
- Experience with Cameo Systems Modeler or equivalent SysML MBSE tool
- Software skills in Python or Julia
- Familiarity with software engineering tools and processes (version control, code review)
- Knowledge of industry standards for electrical and/or software quality practices
- Remote sensing instrument experience across multiple modalities (optical, multispectral, RF) and associated data pipelines
