Lead Hardware Reliability Engineer (Starshield)

About the role

Starshield leverages SpaceX's Starlink technology and launch capability to support national security efforts. While Starlink is designed for consumer and commercial use, Starshield is designed for government use, with an initial focus on earth observation, communications, and hosted payloads.

This is an opportunity to build and lead a hardware reliability team for Starshield production. You will identify, analyze, and resolve hardware and process failures to improve the robustness, yield, and documentation of Starshield subassemblies. This role spans PCBA production, battery builds, solar arrays, tanks, and mechanical assemblies such as actuators, reaction wheels, torque rods, and star trackers. You will partner with manufacturing, design, quality, and supply chain teams to strengthen build processes, raise first-pass yield, and lead containment when hardware or process issues put production at risk.

Responsibilities

• Lead and hire a team of hardware reliability engineers supporting Starshield production
• Provide technical mentorship and guidance to team members leading root cause investigations of subassembly and process failures
• Align goals and priorities with production and partner engineering teams to achieve program reliability, yield, and rate objectives
• Collaborate with team members to create personalized career growth plans that build their technical capabilities and accelerate progress toward their professional goals
• Drive improvements to products and processes that are not meeting design or production requirements through data-driven decisions, using yield and defect monitoring to identify common failure modes
• Lead containment activities for nonconforming hardware, including isolation of suspect product, impact assessment, and coordination of disposition and recovery
• Improve build processes, work instructions, and production documentation to reduce defects and increase first-pass yield across assigned subassemblies
• Lead qualification of production processes for assigned subassemblies, establishing process readiness before rate production
• Lead PFMEA reviews with manufacturing and design partners to identify process risks, prioritize controls, and drive risk reduction
• Proactively escalate major hardware and process concerns, secure appropriate resources, and maintain clear communication to drive timely resolution and team alignment
• Maintain thorough documentation of failure analysis findings, process investigations, test results, and corrective actions
• Collaborate with the on-orbit reliability team, driving timely improvements to production through on-orbit investigation findings

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, process engineering, materials science, or other engineering discipline
• 3+ years of experience in hardware development, manufacturing process engineering, failure analysis, or reliability engineering
• 1+ years of experience leading a project, team, or people

Preferred Skills and Experience

• Strong analytical skills with an excellent ability to communicate and collaborate with partners in all disciplines at multiple levels in the organization
• Demonstrated ability to advocate for and implement robust solutions that stand the test of time
• Experience deploying large-scale and/or high-impact solutions in a manufacturing environment
• Experience improving manufacturing processes, work instructions, and production documentation to increase yield and reduce defects
• Experience leading containment, material review, or nonconformance response for production hardware
• Hands-on experience with one or more of the following: PCBA production, battery assembly, solar array manufacturing, pressure vessels or tanks, or electromechanical assemblies (actuators, reaction wheels, torque rods, star trackers, or similar)
• Demonstrated experience troubleshooting and root causing hardware or process failures
• Experience with statistical process control, process capability analysis, yield analysis, and defect Pareto methods
• Familiarity with manufacturing process controls such as soldering, bonding, welding, torque, cleanliness, leak/pressure testing, or similar process-critical operations
• Experience with environmental testing such as HALT/HASS, thermal, vibration, and TVAC
• Active Top Secret, Top Secret SCI, or DOE Level Q clearance, or the ability and willingness to obtain one

Additional Requirements

• Able to work extended hours and weekends as needed
• An active clearance may provide the opportunity for you to work on sensitive SpaceX missions; if so, you will be subject to pre-employment drug and random drug and alcohol test.

Pay range

Lead: $155,000.00 - $215,000.00/per year

Your actual level and base salary will be determined on a case-by-case basis and may vary based on the following considerations: job-related knowledge and skills, education, and experience.

Base salary is just one part of your total rewards package at SpaceX. You may also be eligible for long-term incentives, in the form of company stock or long-term cash awards, as well as potential discretionary bonuses and the ability to purchase additional stock at a discount through an Employee Stock Purchase Plan.

You will also receive access to comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage, access to a 401(k) retirement plan, short and long-term disability insurance, life insurance, paid parental leave, and various other discounts and perks. You may also accrue 3 weeks of paid vacation and will be eligible for 10 or more paid holidays per year.

Employees accrue paid sick leave pursuant to Company policy which satisfies or exceeds the accrual, carryover, and use requirements of the law.

Itar Requirements

• To conform to U.S. Government export regulations, applicant must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (aka green card holder), (iii) Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or (iv) Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State. Learn more about the ITAR here.