Founding Hardware Engineer

Flynavi; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flight training and pilot’s license

Impactful contributions to flight safety

Opportunities for leadership roles

Job summary

A pioneering hardware company in San Francisco seeks a founding engineer to lead the development of an advanced edge computing device. You will own the entire hardware product lifecycle, focusing on rugged designs and seamless data transmission. Ideal candidates have over seven years of experience in systems engineering, capable of managing the certification of complex devices. The role offers unique opportunities, including flight training and leading hardware innovations within the team.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of experience in systems engineering or connected hardware development.
• Deep understanding of electronics design including PCB schematics.
• Experience collaborating with designers for rugged hardware enclosures.

Responsibilities

• Lead the technical design of next-generation edge compute nodes.
• Architect real-time data pipelines for high-fidelity audio and telemetry.
• Own the hardware validation lifecycle and regulatory certification.

Skills

Embedded C/C++

Systems engineering

PCB design

Wireless communication modules

Job description

You’ll be taken to our application form on Ashby.

Navi captures everything a pilot sees and hears. The Wave is how we do it — the hardware that lives in the cockpit, captures flight data, and streams it to the cloud in real time. You're building the next generation of that device.

About the role

This is a founding hardware role. You own the entire physical product — from bare-metal architecture through PCB design, ruggedized enclosure, embedded firmware, environmental certification, fleet deployment, and cloud integration. This is Version 2 of the Wave, and you are the definitive technical voice for every decision that shapes it.

The device has to survive cockpit environments — heat, vibration, RF noise — while continuously streaming high-bandwidth audio and telemetry over wireless networks without dropping a frame. It has to be deployable across hundreds of aircraft and manageable as a fleet. It has to meet certification standards for operating in aircraft. And it has to be built fast, because Navi is already deployed at flight schools and the U.S. Air Force and demand is accelerating.

If you thrive in high-autonomy environments and love building mission-critical edge devices that work in the real world — not on a bench — this is your role.

What you’ll do

Lead the end-to-end technical design of Navi’s next-generation edge compute node — architecture, component selection, PCB layout, and mechanical enclosure

Build hardware that is ruggedized for cockpit environments — thermal, vibrational, and environmental stress — and optimized for continuous wireless data transmission

Architect real-time data pipelines for processing and streaming high-fidelity audio and complex telemetry from the edge to the cloud with minimal latency

Own the hardware validation lifecycle — environmental testing, quality assurance, and securing regulatory and industry-specific certifications for hardware operating in aircraft

Develop and oversee embedded firmware and edge processing logic — real-time operating systems, on-device compute, and fleet-wide OTA update infrastructure

Guide the architecture of live cloud-based telemetry dashboards to ensure seamless data ingestion and real-time visibility from deployed devices

Collaborate with software and ML engineers to ensure the hardware captures exactly what the intelligence layer needs to generate automated debriefs

About you

7+ years of experience in systems engineering, embedded edge compute, or connected hardware development — with a track record of bringing a complex device to market, not just prototyping one

Deep understanding of electronics design — PCB schematics, microcontrollers, wireless communication modules (cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth)

Experience collaborating with industrial or mechanical designers to build ruggedized enclosures that survive challenging thermal, vibrational, and environmental conditions

Strong proficiency in embedded C/C++ or Python for edge applications, with experience running RTOS or embedded Linux

Familiarity with edge-to-cloud architecture, device fleet management, and building scalable live data infrastructure

Hands-on experience navigating rigorous hardware certification processes and environmental testing standards

You own projects end to end in ambiguous, fast-moving environments — and you ship

Nice to have

Experience with edge processing and lossless streaming of high-bandwidth data — real-time audio, complex signal processing, or continuous telemetry

Background building hardware for aviation, defense, or other safety-critical regulated industries

Familiarity with avionics data formats, cockpit audio systems, or aircraft electrical environments

Why this role matters

Every piece of intelligence Navi generates starts with the Wave. The AI is only as good as the data the hardware captures — and in a cockpit, there are no second chances. A dropped audio frame is a missed instructor callout. A connectivity gap is a blind spot in the debrief. You’re building the device that makes the entire platform possible, and it has to work perfectly every single flight.

What you’ll get

Flight training — earn your pilot’s license and build with true domain expertise

Impact you can see — the device you build will be in cockpits at flight schools, airlines, and the U.S. Air Force

A role that scales into hardware leadership as we grow

How we work

Find a way. We don’t wait for permission or perfect information. Ideas come from anywhere regardless of title. Figure it out, ship it, iterate.

Creativity over control. First principles over process. We’d rather have a creative solution that’s 80% right today than a perfect one next quarter.

Update fast. Come in with a hypothesis, throw it away when the data says otherwise. Ego has no place here.

Intensity with focus. We work hard because the mission demands it. Clarity on what matters is how we make that sustainable.