MDAO Lead Architect — Weapons Performance

Zone 5 Technologies; San Luis Obispo (CA); On-site; USD 161,000 - 238,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Comprehensive benefits

401k with company-match

Paid time off

Holiday and sick time

Job summary

Zone 5 Technologies in San Luis Obispo, California, is redefining unmanned aircraft systems with autonomous solutions that push the boundaries of UAS technology. We seek an experienced MDAO Lead to unite aerodynamics, structures, propulsion, and GNC into vehicle‑level trade studies for air‑launched effects, interceptors, and next‑generation munitions.

You will mentor engineers, set technical direction, and collaborate across disciplines to deliver robust designs from concept sizing through

Qualifications

• 10+ years leading multidisciplinary design and optimization in program-driven environments.
• Experience delivering MDAO efforts to real hardware on a program of record.
• Hands-on with OpenMDAO or similar frameworks for system-level studies.

Responsibilities

• Lead MDAO efforts combining aerodynamics, structures, propulsion and GNC into vehicle-level trade studies.
• Document procedures for sizing, trade studies, and optimization; improve data consistency.
• Develop automated workflows integrating CAD, CFD, FEA and simulations into optimization loops.
• Author and maintain architecture documentation for the MDAO toolset.
• Establish development pipelines (Git, CI/CD, issue tracking) for toolset upkeep.
• Mentor engineers and present trade studies at design reviews (PDR/CDR).

Skills

MDAO leadership

Multidisciplinary design

Technical leadership

Written communication

Problem solving

Education

Bachelor's in Aerospace/Mechanical

Master's preferred

Tools

OpenMDAO

ModelCenter

Phoenix Integration

Cameo

Python

MATLAB

Git

CI/CD

SolidWorks

CFD tools

NASTRAN

Job description

Zone 5 Technologies in San Luis Obispo, California, is redefining unmanned aircraft systems with autonomous solutions that push the boundaries of UAS technology. We seek an experienced MDAO Lead to unite aerodynamics, structures, propulsion, and GNC into vehicle‑level trade studies for air‑launched effects, interceptors, and next‑generation munitions.

You will mentor engineers, set technical direction, and collaborate across disciplines to deliver robust designs from concept sizing through