Forward Deployed Engineer

About the role

Mission Architects help customers adopt and succeed on Northwood's ground station network. You'll work with satellite operators to understand their missions, shape requirements, and guide them from first conversation through deployment and beyond. You'll partner closely with Business Development, Engineering, and Program Management throughout.

This role suits a technically credible operator who can build trust with satellite customers, spot opportunities, and turn mission needs into clear priorities for our internal teams.

Responsibilities

• Make customer missions succeed on Northwood's network.
• Serve as the primary technical contact for customers during capture, evaluation, onboarding, and post-deployment.
• Get hands-on with implementation and integration - working directly alongside customers and Engineering to bring up, troubleshoot, and validate their operations on the network.
• Ship code, debug integrations, and validate operations alongside customers and Engineering
• Support Business Development on qualification, proposals, and expansion.
• Lead technical discovery, exchanges, demos, and readiness reviews alongside Program Management.
• Learn each customer's mission, workflows, constraints, decision criteria, and success metrics in depth.
• Translate customer needs into clear priorities for Engineering, Product, and BD.
• Surface friction points, adoption blockers, and recurring needs that should shape the product and network.
• Coordinate onboarding and deployment readiness - clarifying requirements, flagging risks, and aligning internal teams around customer objectives.
• Build reusable discovery frameworks and customer-facing materials that help Northwood scale capture and customer success.

Basic Qualifications

• 7+ years in customer-facing technical roles: solutions or systems engineering, mission operations, technical business development, capture engineering, solutions architecture, or TAM.
• Bachelor's in EE, CE, CS, Aerospace, or related field - or equivalent experience with mission systems, ground systems, networking, cloud, or satellite operations.
• Track record taking complex customer engagements from discovery through deployment or expansion.
• Proven ability to build trust with technical customers and turn ambiguous mission needs into concrete priorities.
• Comfortable working in ambiguous environments spanning hardware, software, networking, and business objectives.
• Strong communicator - able to lead technical conversations, write clear customer materials, and brief internal stakeholders.
• Effective across BD, Engineering, Product, Program Management, and customer teams.
• Willing to travel up to 30%.

Preferred Qualifications

• Background in satellite communications, RF, space operations, ground stations, or telecom infrastructure.
• Experience with proposals, technical evaluations, demos, pilots, or proof-of-concept work.
• Experience managing technical relationships in mission-critical environments.
• Familiarity with APIs, networking protocols, telemetry, scheduling systems, cloud infrastructure, or mission assurance.
• Ability to obtain or hold TS/SCI clearance.

Additional Requirements

• This position requires successfully obtaining and maintaining a Top Secret Security Clearance as a condition of employment. While the clearance may not be immediately necessary upon hire, we encourage you to initiate the application process promptly upon accepting this offer. Your ability to secure the necessary clearance is essential for fulfilling key responsibilities of the role. Should you be unable to obtain it, Northwood Space reserves the right to modify or terminate your employment to align with optional needs.
• Must be willing to work extended hours and weekends as needed
• This role requires being on-site 5 days per week

Additional Information

To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.