Chief Engineer

Vight; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 260,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Cash compensation

Medical and dental

Job summary

Vight is seeking a Chief Engineer to own the execution of the aircraft design from subscale flight tests to the first full-scale MOSAIC aircraft. You will work directly with the founder and lead a small team across flight sciences, GNC, propulsion, avionics, structures, batteries, flight test, suppliers, and certification.

Your near-term focus is turning subscale testing into actionable, full-scale learning, closing high-leverage requirements, and guiding build-versus-buy decisions that impact

Qualifications

• Experience leading aircraft-scale programs or flight vehicle ownership.
• Ability to translate high-level vehicle vision into verifiable requirements.
• Proven track record making fast, high-leverage engineering trade-offs.

Responsibilities

• Own the aircraft-level baseline across aerodynamics, flight mechanics, GNC, propulsion, avionics, structures, performance, mass, cost, and certification.
• Translate vehicle vision into clear requirements for the team to build, test, and review.
• Turn subscale flight tests into full-scale design learning through instrumentation and data correlation.
• Drive internal reviews with clear owners, evidence, stop criteria, and dates.
• Own long-lead trades (e.g., propulsion, battery, flight-control stack) decisions.
• Build an engineering cadence for fast, good-enough decisions backed by tests.

Skills

Aircraft engineering leadership

Systems engineering for aerospace

GNC/avionics integration

Flight test and data analysis

Decision-making under uncertainty

Job description

About Vight

Vight is building private use eVTOLs that make point to point flight as normal as driving, starting with rural property owners and flight clubs. We are a small founding team shipping fast in the real world with subscale VTOLs and a clear path to two seat, FAA MOSAIC aircraft and beyond.

About Vight

Vight is building private use eVTOLs that make point to point flight as normal as driving, starting with rural property owners and flight clubs. We are a small founding team shipping fast in the real world with subscale VTOLs and a clear path to two seat, FAA MOSAIC aircraft and beyond. Backed by leading investors and operators, our team and advisors include engineering leaders behind world‑class hardware at Airbus Vahana, Kittyhawk, SpaceX and Rivian. We want the hard problems you solve here with other exceptional engineers to be your life's work.

Role

Your job is to own the execution of Vight's aircraft design from subscale flight test through our first full‑scale MOSAIC aircraft. Working directly with the founder, you will lead a small team of founding engineers across flight sciences, GNC, propulsion, avionics, structures, batteries, flight test, suppliers, and certification. The near‑term job is to make subscale testing produce full‑scale learning, close the highest‑leverage aircraft requirements, and drive the build‑versus‑buy decisions that most affect schedule, cost, safety, and performance.

What You Will Do

• Own the aircraft‑level technical baseline across aerodynamics, flight mechanics, GNC, propulsion, avionics, structures, performance, mass, cost, and certification.
• Translate the vehicle vision into clear aircraft and subsystem requirements that the team can build, test, and review against.
• Turn subscale flight tests into full‑scale design learning through instrumentation, staged validation, flight‑data correlation, and disciplined model updates.
• Drive internal concept and delta reviews, keeping each open gap tied to an owner, evidence needed, stop criteria, and decision date.
• Own the decision framework for long‑lead trades such as variable‑pitch props, motors, inverters, battery pack, avionics backbone, flight‑control stack, and critical test infrastructure.
• Build an engineering cadence where the team makes fast, good‑enough decisions under uncertainty, then uses tests and flight data to tighten or reverse them.

You Might Be A Fit If You

• Have owned aircraft‑level engineering decisions on a real flight vehicle, ideally in eVTOL, VTOL, UAV, experimental aircraft, or another integrated aerospace program.
• Can zoom from system architecture to component details and back without losing the aircraft‑level trade.
• Think from first principles and challenge requirements before propagating them.
• Are comfortable making fast, reversible decisions from incomplete data, then tightening them as the evidence gets better.
• Know how to run reviews that turn open questions into decisions, tests, or named blockers at speed.
• Are mission‑driven about practical personal flight and can reason about failures, redundancy, detection, and degraded operation at the aircraft level.

Nice To Have

• Flight sciences, vehicle integration, or equivalent aircraft‑level ownership.
• Tilt‑wing, tilt‑rotor, distributed electric propulsion, or autonomy‑enabled aircraft experience.
• Evidence that you learn quickly, turn new information into hard decisions, and close the loop from analysis to test to design update.
• Experience with failure modes, redundancy, control allocation, model correlation, and safety review discipline.
• Build‑versus‑buy judgment around motors, inverters, batteries, variable‑pitch props, avionics, or test infrastructure.

What We Offer

• Aircraft‑level technical authority at the ground floor of a new personal aviation company.
• Fast‑cycle, software‑defined hardware development with subscale VTOLs in the air and a clear path toward full‑scale aircraft.
• The chance to define the engineering culture, technical bar, and first aircraft program very early.
• Competitive early‑stage cash compensation, strong equity for true Chief Engineer scope, and a transition plan for the right person if timing requires it.
• Medical and dental included.