Senior Electrical Design Engineer

Besxar Space Industries, Inc. (Besxar) is building off-Earth foundries that use the natural ultra-high vacuum of space as a manufacturing input. Our Fabships are designed to produce trusted, ultra-high-yield semiconductor materials that are difficult or impossible to make on Earth at comparable purity and defect performance.

We are not building a science project; we are building a new industrial capability. That means real hardware, rapid iteration, disciplined execution, and a willingness to challenge assumptions from first principles as we design, fly, learn, and improve mission by mission.

About the Team

Electrical engineering is central to Besxar’s ability to turn space into a factory floor. This role sits at the core of Fabship development: leading electrical engineering R&D, owning major ECAD assemblies, and translating ambiguous mission and business requirements into flightworthy electrical hardware and integration plans. You will help define how the electrical team operates as we scale.

You will work shoulder-to-shoulder with systems, mechanical, software, materials, manufacturing, and test to build flight hardware on real schedules. The expectation is hands‑on leadership across architecture, schematic capture, PCB layout oversight, analysis, build, bring‑up, integration, test, failure learning, and design iteration.

• Lead electrical design and R&D for Besxar Fabships, including architecture development, trade studies, detailed design, and integration strategy across power electronics, avionics, RF subsystems, instrumentation, DAQ, test interfaces, and supporting ground hardware.
• Directly own major ECAD assemblies and electrical product structure/BOM for critical systems; maintain strong configuration discipline, clear interfaces, robust libraries, and high-quality release packages for schematics, layouts, fabrication notes, assembly documentation, and released design data.
• Translate system requirements into manufacturable, testable, high-reliability electrical designs that balance performance, mass, power, thermal behavior, radiation tolerance, EMI/EMC, fault protection, serviceability, cost, and schedule.
• Drive the full hardware life cycle from blank-sheet concepting through component selection, schematic capture, PCB layout and layout direction/review, prototype builds, board bring‑up, verification, qualification, vehicle integration, and flight or mission feedback.
• Design and analyze circuits and assemblies for high-power electronics, power conversion and distribution, mixed-signal interfaces, RF signal chains, spacecraft instrumentation, DAQ systems, and diverse sensor/actuator interfaces using space-rated and radiation-tolerant or rad‑hard components where appropriate.
• Lead hands‑on assembly, lab bring‑up, and integration of PCBAs, harnesses, enclosures, and test setups.
• Create or review board bring‑up test plans and procedures, work instructions, and associated documentation, along with higher level test-plans, functional test procedures, assembly work-instructions and procedures, and environmental test-limit definitions.
• Lead development of post-launch inspection criteria, checkout flows, and test plans needed for repeated flight operations.
• Develop HITL and bench test capabilities to validate subsystem behavior, characterize performance, close requirements, and accelerate debugging across development and integration.
• Perform and review electrical analyses needed to close designs with appropriate engineering margin, including worst‑case and derating analysis, grounding and isolation, EMI/EMC, radiation and environmental considerations, and failure modes and risk assessments.
• Bring a strong lessons‑learned mindset: use prior design experience, integration results, supplier issues, operational unit behavior during environmental test and on-orbit operation, and failure investigations to improve each hardware revision and avoid repeating mistakes.
• Partner with technicians, manufacturing, supply chain, and external vendors to move assemblies from design through fabrication, inspection, PCBA assembly, rework, verification, integration, and environmental test.
• Lead or contribute to design reviews, root‑cause investigations, anomaly resolution, and configuration changes with a high bar for clear communication and sound engineering judgment.
• Help define how electrical engineering is done at Besxar, including ECAD conventions, library management, design checklists, release processes, test standards, and cross-functional review norms.
• Mentor other engineers and contribute technical leadership as the electrical team grows.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Physics, or a similar technical discipline, or equivalent practical experience.
• 8+ years of progressive electrical design engineering experience developing complex hardware products from concept through build, integration, and test.
• Demonstrated ownership of large ECAD assemblies and electrical product development for highly integrated spacecraft, aerospace, defense, semiconductor/process equipment, or other high failure-consequence systems.
• Strong proficiency in a modern ECAD platform (e.g., Altium Designer, Cadence Allegro/OrCAD, Xpedition, or similar) and released documentation packages, including schematics, PCB layout, fabrication/assembly documentation, revision control, and PDM/PLM workflows.
• Strong electrical design fundamentals, including analog and mixed-signal design, power electronics, grounding and shielding, component selection, radiation protection schemes, interface definition, and hardware verification.
• Hands‑on build and assembly experience; comfortable working directly with hardware in the lab, on the floor, or with suppliers to debug interfaces, close issues, and improve designs.
• Experience designing, integrating, or qualifying high-reliability electronics using space-rated, radiation-tolerant, or rad‑hard components.
• Experience with lab equipment and development testing of electronic assemblies and subsystems, including oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, power supplies, waveform generators, DAQ systems, and other instrumentation used for characterization, troubleshooting, and validation.
• Demonstrated ability to apply lessons learned from previous designs, build issues, and test outcomes to improve robustness, manufacturability, and development speed.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to document assumptions, present at design reviews, and drive cross-functional alignment.
• Demonstrated ability to operate as a self-starter in ambiguously-defined environments; you can define requirements, challenge assumptions, make sound tradeoffs, and deliver without heavy oversight.
• Experience developing spacecraft, satellite, launch, RF, or other hardware intended for vacuum, thermal, vibration, shock, and radiation environments.
• Experience with high-power converters, power distribution architectures, load switching/protection, and dense electromechanical integration for constrained platforms.
• Experience with RF hardware, communications links, high-frequency interconnect, or mixed-signal signal chains that require careful layout, isolation, and test discipline.
• Experience with processors, FPGAs, memory, ADCs/DACs, sensor interfaces, and common digital communications buses such as SPI, I2C, CAN, Ethernet, RS422, or similar.
• Experience developing HITL systems, automated test infrastructure, or qualification setups; proficiency writing scripts for test automation, data collection, and analysis in Python, MATLAB, or similar.
• Experience selecting components for radiation environments and applying derating, worst-case analysis, FMEA, SEE/TID tradeoffs, or similar reliability methods.
• Experience with EMI/EMC-aware design, grounding/shielding strategy, and diagnosing test exceedances to closure.
• Experience supporting environmental or qualification testing, including thermal vacuum, vibration, shock, EMI/EMC, and end-to-end integrated system tests.

Preferred Skills and Experience

• Experience applying DFM/DFA/DFTprinciples to optimize product designs, reducing production costs, improving assembly efficiency, and ensuring robust testable hardware throughout the product life cycle.
• Track record of end-to-end ownership from architecture through test and iteration on complex hardware programs.
• Experience in early-stage or high-growth environments where speed, pragmatism, and strong judgment matter.
• Experience mentoring engineers or technicians and helping set standards for a growing hardware team.
• Experience supporting export-controlled or ITAR-sensitive hardware development environments.

Additional Requirements

• Must be willing to work extended hours and/or weekends as needed around test campaigns, flight readiness, and major customer milestones.
• Ability to travel for short and extended trips as needed.

Culture

We value first-principles thinkers who move with urgency and take ownership. We expect engineers to build the system, not just the board; chase down answers; communicate clearly; and use lessons learned to make each build better. We give people autonomy and expect accountability in return. Launch windows and test campaigns can be intense, but we work as a collaborative team that respects one another and stays focused on execution.

This role may require access to export-controlled information. We will follow applicable laws and regulations and work with our compliance function to determine eligibility and required authorizations.

To conform to the U.S. Government export regulations, applicants must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful permanent resident (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.

Base salary will vary depending on job-related knowledge, education, skills, experience, business needs, and market demand. Salary is just one component of our comprehensive compensation package.

Washington DC Pay Range

$175,000 - $225,000 USD