Senior Architect, Factory & Facilities

Canada Rocket Company; Toronto; On-site; CAD 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Job summary

Canada Rocket Company is seeking a Senior Architect to lead the layout and long-term phasing of our factory. You will design the flow of material, parts, people, and vehicles from receiving through fabrication, assembly, integration, test, and shipping to enable fast, safe, and scalable production.

This is a founding role on Canada’s first medium-lift launch vehicle program. You’ll collaborate with a lean design team to govern architecture, electrical, mechanical, structural, and BIM/CAD leads,

Qualifications

• 7+ years of architectural design for industrial or manufacturing facilities.
• Experience planning layouts around manufacturing flow and future expansion.
• Working knowledge of Ontario Building Code and life-safety requirements for industrial occupancies.
• On-site work in Toronto with regular travel to test, launch, and factory sites.
• Proficiency with Revit, AutoCAD, and Bluebeam.

Responsibilities

• Lead the factory master plan: site layout and phased expansion linked to production-rate targets.
• Layout production areas around product flow with manufacturing, test, and supply chain inputs.
• Plan for large-vehicle handling: crane coverage, clear heights, door sizes, and routes.
• Assess sites and buildings for feasibility from architectural, fire and life safety perspectives.
• Review and seal architectural drawings and permit packages.
• Provide preliminary budgets and schedules for new buildings and fit-outs.
• Lead building code, fire, and life-safety strategy for CRC facilities with authorities.
• Coordinate across design team with electrical, mechanical, and structural leads.
• Extend layout discipline to test site, launch site, and Racine location as they grow.

Skills

Industrial facility design

Layout planning

Manufacturing flow

Project management

Site coordination

Communication

Education

Architecture degree

OAA licensure

Tools

Revit

AutoCAD

Bluebeam

Job description

About Canada Rocket Company

Canada Rocket Company is developing Canada's first medium-lift launch vehicle.

We are a team of veterans from SpaceX, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, ArianeGroup, Pangea Propulsion, Tesla, MDA, and more, bringing over a century of combined launch and space systems experience back to Canada.

Our mission is to provide reliable, independent access to space for Canada and its allies in a rapidly expanding global market.

Our approach is defined by pragmatic engineering:

• We utilize a single 725 kN engine that scales from light- to medium-lift via engine clustering.
• We lean on simple, proven technologies to reach orbit faster, avoiding the pitfalls of complex or novel designs.
• We test early and often, catching problems on the bench instead of at the pad.

Backed by over $20M in funding secured within our first four months, including the largest all-Canadian seed round in the sector and an $8.3M Department of National Defence grant, we are moving with the speed and institutional backing required to meet Canada’s orbital launch needs.

About the role

Canada Rocket Company is building the infrastructure that gets rockets built, tested, and launched. We’re looking for a Senior Architect to lead the layout and long-term phasing of our factory — and to bring the same thinking to every CRC site.

You lead the factory plan, working with a design team. You understand how a production facility actually works — how material, parts, people, and vehicles move from receiving through fabrication, assembly, integration, test, and shipping — and you lay out buildings that make that flow fast, safe, and expandable. You plan today’s building so it can grow with our production rate without stopping the line. It’s a founding role on a factory that will build Canada’s first medium-lift launch vehicles.

This role is part of CRC’s infrastructure group, a small team built to take our test, launch, and manufacturing sites from concept to operation: design defines it, supply chain sources it, construction builds it, and facilities runs it. You lead your discipline within the design team, working alongside the architecture, electrical, mechanical, structural, and BIM/CAD leads. The team is deliberately lean, so the boundaries below describe where accountability sits, not where your involvement stops.

What you’ll do

• Lead the factory master plan: site layout, building program, and phased expansion tied to production-rate targets.
• Lay out production areas around product flow, working with manufacturing, test, and supply chain on capacity studies, equipment layouts, and material and vehicle flow.
• Plan for large-vehicle handling: crane coverage, clear heights, door sizes, and routes from integration to shipping.
• Assess sites and buildings for feasibility from architectural, fire and life safety, structural, and MEP perspectives.
• Review and seal architectural drawings and permit packages.
• Provide preliminary budgets and schedules for new buildings and fit-outs.
• Lead building code, fire, and life safety strategy for CRC facilities with authorities having jurisdiction.
• Provide architectural direction and review across the design team, and coordinate with the electrical, mechanical, and structural leads.
• Bring the same layout discipline to the test site, launch site, and Racine location as they grow.

What you’re not responsible for

• High-level regulatory strategy and permitting with governing bodies (Transport Canada, NRCan, MECP, etc.).
• Day-to-day field execution, trade contractor supervision, and site safety — owned by the Construction Manager.
• Sourcing, purchase order issuance, and vendor commercial terms — owned by Supply Chain.
• Ongoing operation and maintenance of completed facilities — owned by the Facilities Manager.
• Electrical, mechanical, and structural engineering design — owned by the respective discipline leads.
• Manufacturing process and equipment selection — owned by Manufacturing.

Qualifications

Required

• Degree in architecture.
• Licensed architect with the OAA (Ontario Association of Architects), in good standing.
• 7+ years of architectural design for industrial or manufacturing facilities, including at least one production facility taken from concept to operation.
• Demonstrated ability to plan layouts around manufacturing flow and future expansion, not just around the building.
• Working command of the Ontario Building Code and fire and life safety requirements for industrial occupancies.
• Proficiency with Revit, AutoCAD, and Bluebeam.
• Able to work on-site at our Toronto facility, with regular travel to our test, launch, and factory sites.
• Comfortable in a startup environment where process is still being built.

Nice to have

• Automotive, gigafactory, data center, automotive, aerospace, or other high-rate manufacturing facility experience.
• Experience with hazardous-material, high-hazard industrial, or test facility occupancies.
• Factory simulation, capacity modelling, or lean manufacturing background.
• Experience with large-span buildings, heavy cranes, and oversized-product logistics.