UAS Senior Systems Engineer

This position offers FULLY REMOTE opportunities for candidates across the United States. Preferred location: Huntsville, Alabama

Airbus U.S. Space & Defense, Inc offers advanced solutions to meet the most complex U.S. defense, security, space, and intelligence requirements. Celebrating over 50 years in the US, we remain a trusted government partner, leveraging world-class satellite, laser communication, rotor and fixed wing solutions to help our national security, defense and space focused customers meet their missions.

Airbus U.S. looks to employ a commitment driven team, dedicated to enabling our customer's mission success. We are committed to maintaining a diverse and inclusive work environment and a welcoming and engaging staff. With competitive compensation and superior employee benefits, as well as a commitment to fostering individual career growth, Airbus U.S. is the place where top talent wants to work.

Position Summary:

Lead or support the development and integration of a variety of payloads onto high altitude Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) for Intelligence Community (IC) and Department of Defense (DoD) customers. Lead or support the UAS payload and engineering program execution through the full project lifecycle, from requirement development, architecture development and trades, specification development, requirements verification, compliance assessment, and operations.

Primary Responsibilities

UAS Systems Engineering - 80%

• Use systems engineering processes and principals to lead or support the integration of US Government (and other) payloads onto the Zephyr high altitude UAS.
  • Plan payload integration projects, provide overall payload system guidance to internal and external payload teams and the customer.
  • Oversee the mechanical, thermal, aerodynamic, communications, electrical, RF, ground support system, and software integration of payloads to the airframe including development of new systems to support payloads.
  • Communicate with US government and industrial partners to interface payloads onto the Zephyr high altitude UAV.
  • Manage engineering risks and prioritize risk mitigations.
  • Manage system and subsystem budgets.
  • Lead the development of subsystem level requirements and requirement flow-down to the various components and parts as necessary.
    • Work with engineering teams, subcontractors, vendors and suppliers to develop subsystems that meet requirements.
  • Conduct system level trade studies.
• Oversee development of required system and subsystem documentation for the full project lifecycle. Specifically, Interface Control Documents (ICD).
• Oversee completion of engineering gates such as the Systems Requirements Review (SRR), Preliminary Design Review (PDR), Critical Design Review (CDR), Test Review Boards (TRB), Flight Readiness Review (FRR).
• Develop and conduct system integration test plans; generate test reports.
• Provide on-site engineering support for engineering tests, final payload integration, and flight-testing activities including defect reporting and tracking.
• Act as subject matter expert (SME) for all things related to Zephyr high altitude UAS payload support subsystems.

Training & Development - 10%

• Assist with the creation engineering guidelines, processes, and procedures.
• Develop and mentor junior engineers in the areas of payloads, Zephyr, and system engineering principals.

Research & Planning - 10%

• Research new UAS technologies that apply to the US Government customer base.
• Propose application of new technology for Airbus provided payloads to increase their applicability to the US Government.
• Develop upstream requirements for the Zephyr UAS in support of future payload capabilities.
• Support payload technical proposal development.

Additional Responsibilities:

Other duties as assigned.

Qualified Experience / Skills / Training:

Education:

• Bachelor's degree in a STEM field or combination of education and experience.

Experience:

• 9+ years of relevant experience (w/ Bachelors), 7+ years w/ Masters, or 5+ years with a PhD.
• The ideal candidate will have 2+ years of experience focused on integration of avionics or payloads onto UAV/satellites.

Knowledge, Skills, Demonstrated Capabilities:

• The selected engineer shall be capable of working with and leading a multidisciplinary team and working without supervision.
• Demonstrated ability to lead engineering projects to