UAV Concept Engineer

Saab; Dunstable; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 90,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

30 days annual leave

Workplace pension scheme 8%

Private medical insurance

Group income protection

Death in service insurance

Up to 5% share matching

Enhanced parental leave

Job summary

Saab UK is seeking a UAV Concept Engineer to strengthen early-stage design, where you translate requirements into sized, analysable air vehicle concepts. You will rapidly iterate geometry, aerodynamics, weights and propulsion, closing the loop with real flight data to ground designs in evidence.

You will work within a multidisciplinary team, developing tools to speed iteration, perform trade studies, and communicate risk and assumptions clearly, in a defence-enabled environment.

Qualifications

• Must have hands-on experience in aircraft sizing and concept-design tooling.
• Experience synthesising flight-test data to improve models and sizing.
• Strong scripting in Python for automation and tool development.
• Familiarity with full conceptual design loop and propulsion integration.

Responsibilities

• Perform aircraft conceptual sizing and constraint analysis to define feasible UAV design points.
• Develop parametric air vehicle geometry and drive it through the analysis loop.
• Produce conceptual outputs: drag polars, lift curves, weight breakdowns, energy/endurance.
• Run design-space exploration and trade studies to enable rapid iteration.
• Synthesize flight-test and bench-test data to validate and improve models.
• Select and shape propulsion concepts and integrate them into analyses.
• Maintain and enhance the concept-design toolchain and automation.
• Document design risk and feed into risk registers.

Skills

Aircraft sizing

Concept-design tooling

Flight-test data synthesis

Python scripting

Design-of-experiments

Aero/propulsion integration

Stability & control

Team collaboration

Tools

OpenVSP

RCAIDE

AVL

XFLR5

Datcom

PX4 / ArduPilot

SITL/HITL

CAD

Job description

Introduction

Saab UK is part of Scandinavia’s largest defence company, bringing together the best of Swedish and British innovation. Saab offers world-leading solutions and services in defence, aviation, space, and civil security to keep people and society safe. Our UK presence has been growing at pace, meaning we can offer a wide range of opportunities for personal fulfilment and career growth. We currently employ over 600 people across eight sites in the UK, and our specialisations include software engineering, underwater robotics, radars, AI, and armed forces training.

Saab UK is part of Scandinavia’s largest defence company, bringing together the best of Swedish and British innovation. Saab offers world-leading solutions and services in defence, aviation, space, and civil security to keep people and society safe. Our UK presence has been growing at pace, meaning we can offer a wide range of opportunities for personal fulfilment and career growth. We currently employ over 600 people across eight sites in the UK, and our specialisations include software engineering, underwater robotics, radars, AI, and armed forces training.

What you will be part of

Saab is a leading defence and security company with an enduring purpose, to help nations keep their people and society safe.

Empowered by its 28,000 talented people, Saab constantly pushes the boundaries of technology to create a safer and more sustainable world.

Saab designs, manufactures and maintains advanced systems in aeronautics, weapons, command and control, sensors and underwater systems.

Saab is headquartered in Sweden. It has major operations all over the world and is part of the domestic defence capability of several nations.

The Role

Blue Bear is a leading autonomy and unmanned systems company. We are continuously innovating within the core area of Autonomy and Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) such as air vehicles, autopilots, navigation solutions, mission systems and ground control stations. We are currently seeking engineers to help conceptualise, size and mature the next generation of our air vehicle platforms.

We are seeking a UAV Concept Engineer to strengthen our early-stage design capability: turning requirements and CONOPS into sized, analysed and testable air vehicle concepts through rapid, iterative trade studies. This role is central to our conceptual design loop, by early exploring design trade space and rapidly iterating through geometry, aerodynamics, weights, propulsion, mission and stability.

A defining part of this role is closing the loop between analysis and reality. You will synthesise data from bench and flight testing, flight logs, telemetry and measured performance and feed it back to correct and improve our conceptual models, sizing methods and surrogates, so each design iteration is grounded in real evidence.

Working as part of the Concepts team, you will bring a proactive, collaborative approach and a passion for fast iteration, sound engineering judgement and building tools and methods that make the whole team faster.

Key Responsibilities

• Perform aircraft conceptual sizing and constraint analysis (wing loading vs thrust/power-to-weight, weight closure, mission/energy sizing) to define feasible design points for new UAV concepts.
• Develop and morph parametric air vehicle geometry and Outer Mould Line and drive it through the analysis loop, regenerating a concept from a defined parameter set.
• Produce the core conceptual outputs each iteration: drag polars, lift curves, weight breakdowns, mission energy/endurance, static margin, trim and control authority.
• Run trade studies and design-space exploration to make optimisation and sensitivity studies fast enough to explore many designs.
• Synthesise flight-test and bench-test data (flight logs, telemetry, measured aero/propulsion performance) and use it to validate, calibrate and improve conceptual models and sizing methods.
• Select and shape propulsion system concepts and integrate them into mission and energy-network performance analysis.
• Maintain, improve and where appropriate build the concept-design toolchain and automation that underpins rapid iteration (geometry, aero, mission, surrogate and data-processing tools).
• Capture and communicate design risk, where the design is immature or sensitive and feed it into the programme risk register.

Qualifications and skills

• We are specifically looking for someone with hands-on experience in aircraft sizing, concept-design tooling, and the synthesis of flight-test data to improve models
• Demonstrable experience in aircraft / UAV conceptual design and sizing, constraint analysis, weight and mission/energy sizing, and closing a design point.
• Hands-on experience with conceptual and preliminary design tools such as OpenVSP, RCAIDE, AVL, XFLR5, Datcom or equivalent in-house tools.
• Sound applied aerodynamics knowledge, drag build-up, lift curves, drag polars and the ability to generate and interpret them for design decisions.
• Experience synthesising flight logs / telemetry / test data and using it to validate and improve analytical models (model calibration, correlation to test).
• Strong scripting and analysis skills in Python (or similar) for automation, data processing and building/using design tools.
• Working understanding of the full conceptual design loop: geometry, aerodynamics, weights, propulsion, mission performance and stability & control, and how the disciplines couple.
• Ability to work iteratively, favouring fast, defensible estimates over slow precision at the conceptual stage, and to communicate assumptions and uncertainty clearly.
• Strong problem-solving skills, sound engineering judgement, and a proactive approach to improving methods and tools.
• Ability to work collaboratively across a small, multidisciplinary engineering team.
• Structural analysis, FEA, airframe structural sizing.
• Stability & control analysis, flight dynamics modelling, and handling-qualities assessment.
• Design-of-experiments for sub systems.
• Propulsion sizing and integration of electric, hybrid-electric or gas turbine systems.
• Experience with PX4 / ArduPilot, SITL/HITL simulation, and processing autopilot flight logs (ULog, MAVLink).
• CAD and geometry handling; exporting/meshing surfaces for higher-fidelity aero (panel/CFD).
• Mid-to high-fidelity aero exposure (panel methods such as FlightStream, or RANS CFD) for validating key design points.
• Experience working in safety-critical, regulated or defence environments.
• Ability to gain SC Clearance.

Saab UK Company Benefits

• 30 days annual leave
• Workplace pension scheme with 8% company contribution
• Private medical insurance
• Group income protection scheme
• Death in service insurance
• Up to 5% share matching scheme
• Company enhanced Maternity/Adoption & Paternity leave.
• + Much more

By submitting an application to Saab UK you consent to undertaking workforce screening activities that may include but are not limited to: Baseline Personnel Security checks, National Security Vetting, reference checks, verification of working rights and in all circumstances preferred candidates will be placed through a security interview.