Radio Frequency Engineer

System One; Exton (PA); On-site; USD 110,000 - 145,000; Full time

Job summary

System One in Exton, PA seeks an experienced RF Hardware Engineer to lead analog and digital RF circuit design for airborne communication and surveillance systems. You will perform design, analysis, simulation, and hands-on board bring-up, tuning, and validation using lab equipment.

You will collaborate across systems, mechanical, software, and certification teams, ensuring EMI/EMC compliance and robust performance in harsh environments, with opportunity to influence product lifecycle from

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or equivalent.

Responsibilities

• Coordinate electrical engineering designs and requirements across Systems, Mechanical, Software, and Certification teams.
• Lead design, analysis, and simulation of RF circuits and interfaces for radios and transponders.
• Hands-on circuit board bring-up, RF tuning, troubleshooting, and validation with lab instruments.
• Provide hardware design support through concept, architecture, design, verification, certification, and production.
• Apply RF engineering practices to airborne communications in harsh EMI environments.
• Design for EMI/EMC, grounding, shielding, filtering, and layout to meet aviation requirements.
• Support environmental, EMI/EMC, and functional testing, analyze results and root-cause investigations.
• Contribute to technical documentation: schematics, analyses, tests, reports for reviews and certification.
• Advance product line through engineering creativity and continuous improvement.

Skills

RF circuit design

Analog & digital design

PCB layout

EMI/EMC principles

Schematic capture

RF testing

RF simulation tools

FPGA/VHDL exposure

Signal integrity

Team collaboration

Education

Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering

Tools

Altium

PCAD

ADS

HFSS

SPICE

VHDL

Job description

• Coordinate electrical engineering designs and requirements within the Innovative Aerosystems Engineering (Systems, Mechanical, Software, etc.) and Certification team.
• Lead and contribute to the design, analysis, and simulation of analog and digital RF circuits, including RF front ends, mixers, oscillators, amplifiers, filters, and high-speed digital interfaces supporting radios and transponders.
• Perform hands‑on circuit board bring‑up, RF tuning, troubleshooting, and validation using laboratory test equipment (e.g., spectrum analyzers, network analyzers, signal generators, oscilloscopes).
• Provide hardware design support across the full product lifecycle-from concept, architecture, and design through verification, qualification, certification, and production.
• Apply sound RF engineering practices to support airborne communication and surveillance products, ensuring robust performance in harsh electromagnetic environments.
• Design for and evaluate EMI/EMC performance, including grounding, shielding, filtering, and layout techniques to meet aviation regulatory and customer requirements.
• Support environmental, EMI/EMC, and functional testing activities for airborne equipment, including analysis of test results and root‑cause investigations.
• Contribute to technical documentation such as schematics, design analyses, test procedures, and reports in support of internal reviews and certification activities.
• Apply engineering creativity and discipline to advance the product line and support continuous improvement initiatives.

PROFESSIONAL REQUIREMENTS:

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or equivalent education.
• 4+ years of electronic design experience with a strong emphasis on analog and digital RF circuit design.
• Demonstrated understanding of RF fundamentals, including impedance matching, noise figure, gain, linearity, phase noise, frequency synthesis, modulation techniques, and signal integrity.
• Solid knowledge of EMI/EMC principles and mitigation techniques relevant to airborne and high‑reliability systems.
• Experience with schematic capture and PCB layout tools such as Altium, PCAD, or equivalent (RF layout experience strongly preferred).
• Familiarity with RF simulation and analysis tools (e.g., ADS, HFSS, SPICE‑based tools) is a plus.
• Familiarity with FPGA development and VHDL is desired, particularly as it relates to RF control, signal processing, or high‑speed digital interfaces.
• Experience with IPC design standards and component derating practices is a plus.
• Strong competencies in circuit analysis, RF debugging, and board‑level troubleshooting.
• Experience with RF component selection and sourcing, including evaluation of performance, availability, and lifecycle risk.
• Interpersonal skills: Collaborative strong critical‑thinking ability and high technical competency

PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS:

• Must be able to see and manipulate small parts.
• Must be a …? etc...