Founding Engineer & UAV Pilot

Flyer Ai; Salisbury; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 85,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Significant Equity

Immediate Impact

Competitive salary

Unlimited PTO

Job summary

Flyer AI in Salisbury, UK is seeking a hands-on UAV engineer with extensive piloting experience to develop and flight-test an autonomous delivery aircraft. You will contribute to the aircraft’s development, run flight trials, and support engineering across design, build, coding, and analysis.

You should bring deep expertise in at least one engineering area and be ready to operate on a small, elite team where responsibilities span both engineering and piloting activities.

Qualifications

• Substantial practical UAV piloting experience with clear flight examples.

Responsibilities

• Develop, test and iterate aircraft and system designs.
• Plan and run flight trials with clear safety objectives.
• Pilot the aircraft during development, testing and trials within procedures.
• Review flight data and investigations to improve future builds/tests.
• Assist in creating operations manuals and training materials.

Skills

UAV piloting

Hands-on engineering

Flight testing

Problem solving

Team collaboration

Tools

Flight controllers

Ground-control software

Flight-log analysis

Job description

Build the aircraft. Fly it. Understand what happened. Improve it.

Salisbury, Wiltshire On-Site Full-time

The first stage is a short Q&A session with our LLM interviewer. If you do not wish to proceed at any stage, you may type "end interview".

What you'll be doing

We're looking for a hands-on engineer with extensive UAV (uncrewed aircraft) piloting experience to help develop and flight-test our autonomous delivery aircraft.

This is both an engineering role and a piloting one. You'll contribute directly to the aircraft's development as well as preparing and conducting flight trials. In our small, elite team, everyone carries more than one role so, when we're not flying, you'll be part of the engineering team: designing, building, coding, analysing or troubleshooting.

Your engineering specialisation could be software, UAV flight control, mechantronics, CAD and structures, aerodynamics, or electrical and electronic engineering. We expect you to bring genuine technical depth in at least one area.

We are building an extremely high performance vehicle. You'll work closely with the founder and the rest of our small, elite engineering team, connecting what we see in flight with the changes we make in the workshop.

Your responsibilities

• Be a core member of the engineering team within your engineering specialisation - developing, testing and iterating our aircraft and system designs.
• Help plan and prepare flight trials, including test objectives, aircraft readiness, crew briefings and clear decisions on safety and airmanship.
• Pilot the aircraft during development and testing, demonstration flights and commercial trials, within the scope of your qualifications, training and the company's operating procedures.
• Review flight behaviour and recorded data, investigate problems and work with the team to improve the next aircraft build or test.
• Assist in and later lead the development of operations manuals and company procedures, training and aircraft flight manuals

The balance between engineering and flying will change with the programme. Both are core parts of the job.

Where you'll fit in

Flyer AI is building a small, focused team to create the next generation of autonomous delivery aircraft. Hard problems, real ownership and genuine technical impact. Our team is hard core - for the team this is not a job, but a grand and exciting mission. We are passionate about making the world a better place, one flying robot at a time.

You’ll join on-site in Salisbury (shortly moving to the Bristol/Bath area) working directly with the founder and the people designing, building and testing the aircraft. This is a role for someone who wants to stay close to the hardware and see their engineering work fly.

What we're looking for

Strong practical capability in at least one engineering discipline.

Substantial practical UAV piloting experience, with clear examples of the aircraft you've flown, your responsibilities and the situations you've handled.

Sound flying judgement, calm decision-making and an understanding of airmanship and flight safety.

First-principles reasoning, strong problem-solving skills and the ability to work with incomplete information.

Teamwork, initiative and the values we share: passion, commitment, courage, integrity and trust.

Practical and or theoretical knowledge of flight control theory.

Familiarity with UAV flight controllers, sensors and peripherals, ground-control software and flight-log analysis.

Developmental UAV flight testing, experimental aircraft or prototype engineering experience.

BVLOS (beyond visual line of sight) operational experience.

Experience integrating, maintaining or troubleshooting UAV systems.

Curiosity about using modern AI tools to improve engineering productivity, while retaining your own technical judgement.

Existing GVC or RPC L1 qualifications are highly desirable but are not essential at application. For the right candidate, we would support obtaining the UK pilot qualifications required for the role, alongside aircraft-specific familiarisation and training.

Substantial practical UAV flying experience is essential. A certificate alone is not a substitute for that experience.

What you'll get

Significant Equity - as a founding team member, you will own a significant stake in the future we are building.

Immediate Impact - you will be one of the first 6 employees, shaping the engineering culture from day one.

Competitive salary - an initial stipend plus salary uplift following fundraising.

Unlimited paid time off - take what you need, when you need it.