Head of Space Test Operations

Anduril Industries; Costa Mesa (CA); On-site; USD 166,000 - 220,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity grants

Top-tier benefits

Job summary

Anduril Industries in Costa Mesa, CA is seeking a Senior Manager, Test Operations to lead the development and production testing across multiple space programs. You will build the test organization from the ground up, hire and grow a 40+ person team, define procedures, and ensure readiness for full-rate production as space vehicles ramp.

This is a build role with significant cross-functional collaboration and a focus on reducing test duration and cost while meeting safety and quality standards.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in engineering, physics or a related technical field.
• 10+ years in spacecraft or space vehicle integration and test, including 5+ years leading test engineers or technicians, and technical lead or manager on at least two complete environmental qualification or acceptance campaigns from procedure definition through data review and disposition.
• Hands-on ownership of at least three of: thermal vacuum, sine or random vibration, acoustic, shock, thermal cycling, EMI/EMC to MIL-STD-461 or equivalent.
• Managed a team of 10 or more engineers and/or technicians spanning at least two test domains - for example functional and electrical test plus environmental test, or test operations plus test station engineering.
• Working knowledge of a recognized space test standard such as SMC-S-016, GSFC-STD-7000 (GEVS) or MIL-STD-1540, including where you tailored it and why.
• Eligible to obtain and maintain an active U.S. Secret security clearance

Responsibilities

• Recruit, mentor and lead a multi-domain test organization spanning functional and electrical test, environmental test, test station and GSE engineering, and test operations - growing from initial hires toward a projected 40+ positions through the production ramp.
• Own the transfer of test knowledge, procedures and tooling from development-site test engineers into the production test team, including training, certification and proficiency standards for test engineers and technicians.
• Coordinate closely with Launch Operations stakeholders to ensure all System Test procedures, resources, and approval criteria are followed during launch campaigns. As needed, deployed Test personnel to support, train, and oversee launch operations to ensure compliance.
• Define and own vehicle-level and subassembly acceptance test procedures and qualification campaigns, including test flow, entrance and exit criteria, and data review gates.
• Lead Test Readiness Reviews and test campaign readiness assessments; serve as approval authority for test procedures run on flight hardware.
• Own environmental test execution - thermal vacuum, sine and random vibration, acoustic, shock, thermal cycling, and EMI/EMC - including chamber and table scheduling, fixture and instrumentation readiness, and anomaly disposition.
• Drive design-for-test requirements into vehicle, payload and subassembly designs before CDR, with the explicit objective of reducing test duration and test station count at rate.
• Challenge inherited test requirements: identify tests that can be combined, moved to a lower assembly level, automated, or eliminated at acceptable risk, and carry those cases through the requirement owners with data.
• Specify production environmental test capability - chamber count and size, vibration table capacity, EMI/EMC screen rooms - and own the test capacity model behind it.
• Represent test operations up and out: support proposal development and Basis of Estimate content for test scope, present at technical and milestone reviews, and brief customers and business line leadership on test readiness, capability and risk.

Skills

Test Operations Leadership

Space Vehicle Testing

Environmental Testing

Team Building

Education

Bachelor's degree in engineering, physics or related field

Tools

Test equipment

Job description

Anduril Industries in Costa Mesa, CA is seeking a Senior Manager, Test Operations to lead the development and production testing across multiple space programs. You will build the test organization from the ground up, hire and grow a 40+ person team, define procedures, and ensure readiness for full-rate production as space vehicles ramp.

This is a build role with significant cross-functional collaboration and a focus on reducing test duration and cost while meeting safety and quality standards.