Controls Engineer

Cambridge Aerospace; Cambridge; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 90,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Stock options

Private medical

Dental

Cycle to work scheme

Job summary

Cambridge Aerospace in Cambridge, United Kingdom, is seeking a Controls Engineer to develop and tune inner-loop control laws and effector-level logic, delivering stable, agile, and precise vehicle behaviour across the full flight envelope.

You will design and implement fast flight-control loops for high‑speed guided platforms, work with actuation, structures and aerodynamics teams, and contribute to advanced defence aerospace programs.

Qualifications

• Experience working on high-speed guided systems (missiles, interceptors, high-performance UAVs, etc.).
• Transonic flight experience - deep familiarity with control challenges around shock dynamics and aerodynamic nonlinearities.
• Canard control experience; ability to model and tune multi-surface control systems.
• Strong actuator mixing and tuning experience (rate limiting, control allocation, system-level coupling).

Responsibilities

• Design, implement, and tune flight control loops for fast-moving guided platforms
• Develop control architectures suitable for high-G, high-rate, and rapidly changing aerodynamic states
• Perform actuator-level control, including mixing logic and health management
• Support linear and nonlinear stability analysis (eigenstructure, gain/phase margins, robustness evaluation)
• Work closely with actuation, structures, and aerodynamics teams to ensure control authority and bandwidth targets are met

Skills

Flight control

Canard control

TVC experience

Actuator tuning

Guided systems

Tools

MATLAB/Simulink

Job description

As a Controls Engineer, you will develop and tune inner‑loop control laws and effector‑level logic to deliver stable, agile, and precise vehicle behaviour across the full flight envelope, including extreme high‑dynamics regimes.

Responsibilities

• Design, implement, and tune flight control loops for fast‑moving guided platforms
• Develop control architectures suitable for high‑G, high‑rate, and rapidly changing aerodynamic states
• Perform actuator‑level control, including mixing logic (e.g., canard + tail + TVC integration) and health management
• Support linear and nonlinear stability analysis (eigenstructure, gain/phase margins, robustness evaluation)
• Work closely with actuation, structures, and aerodynamics teams to ensure control authority and bandwidth targets are met

Requirements

• Experience working on high‑speed guided systems (missiles, interceptors, high‑performance UAVs, etc.)
• Transonic flight experience - deep familiarity with control challenges around shock dynamics and aerodynamic nonlinearities
• Canard control experience; ability to model and tune multi‑surface control systems
• Strong actuator mixing and tuning experience (rate limiting, control allocation, system‑level coupling)

Preferred Qualifications/Experience

• Experience in fast-paced R&D or startup environments, with rapid prototype iteration times
• Defence or advanced aerospace background
• Thrust Vector Control (TVC) experience

What We Offer

• Competitive compensation and stock options
• Private Medical & Dental
• Cycle to work scheme

About Us

The mission of Cambridge Aerospace is to eliminate the risk of existential war in Europe. That risk comes from the air – low-cost drones and cruise missiles now manufactured in colossal volumes by our adversaries, ballistic missiles capable of ending the world as we know it, and a new generation of hypersonic weapons that evade every existing defence.

We’re building low-cost interceptors that defeat these threats, and the surveillance systems to detect and target them – at a cost taxpayers can afford, at the pace the threat demands, and with sovereign supply chains that assure delivery.

We have immense backing from the world’s best venture funds. We’re one of the fastest growing defence technology companies in history. And we’re hiring the best engineers to prosecute the mission.

If you are in the top 1%, willing to work harder than you ever have, build technology better than anyone else, and contribute to the defining challenge of our time, now is the time to join us.

Our Commitment to Inclusion

We’re committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace. If you’re excited about this role but don’t meet every requirement, we still encourage you to apply.