Satellite Platform Lead (Mechanical) – Onsite in SJ

Muon Space, Inc.; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 190,000 - 216,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity compensation

Medical, dental, vision insurance

401k retirement plan

Paid vacation and holidays

Job summary

Muon Space is seeking a Staff Mechanical Engineer to serve as the mechanical design technical lead for a satellite class. You will own the class architecture—bus structure, thermal, solar, and payload accommodations—while guiding mission instances from requirements through launch integration.

This is an IC role with potential for small-team leadership, and it requires onsite work at our San Jose location three days a week.

Qualifications

• 10+ years designing and testing flight hardware for space missions.
• Proven track record owning a spacecraft platform across multiple missions.
• Experience maturing designs, not only new concepts.
• Expertise in structural/mechanical analysis, thermal management, or TVAC/vibration.
• Proficient with drawings, GD&T, BOMs, FAIs, tolerances, mass budgets; CAD/PLM/FEA tools.

Responsibilities

• Own the mechanical architecture and design direction for a satellite class, balancing concurrent missions.
• Serve as mission mechanical lead delivering bus structure, thermal, solar, and payload solutions from requirements to launch.
• Lead design, analysis, and optimization of spacecraft structures and subsystems.
• Iterate satellite class for improved performance, mass, cost, manufacturability, scalable to constellation quantities.
• Work with customers on requirements, reviews, and proposals; partner with Business Development for platform enhancements.
• Define and champion mechanical design standards and review processes.
• Lead design reviews (PDR/CDR/MRR) and environmental tests (vibration, TVAC, EMI).
• Coordinate multidisciplinary execution across teams.
• Mentor engineers; hire, onboard, and manage a small team as needed.

Skills

Spacecraft architecture

Thermal management

Structural analysis

SolidWorks

FEA tools

GD&T

PLM

Vendor management

Mentoring

Communication

Education

B.S. in Mechanical Engineering

Tools

SolidWorks

Ansys

Python

MATLAB

PLM

Job description

Muon Space is seeking a Staff Mechanical Engineer to serve as the mechanical design technical lead for a satellite class. You will own the class architecture—bus structure, thermal, solar, and payload accommodations—while guiding mission instances from requirements through launch integration.

This is an IC role with potential for small-team leadership, and it requires onsite work at our San Jose location three days a week.