Senior Avionics Engineer — Flight-Ready Spacecraft Hardware

Fortastra Corporation; Los Angeles (CA); On-site; USD 130,000 - 170,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Unlimited PTO

Comprehensive Healthcare

Equity

401(k)

Social Events

Job summary

Fortastra Corporation is seeking a Sr. Avionics Engineer to design and deliver spacecraft avionics hardware and embedded systems through the full product lifecycle—from concept and architecture to PCB bring-up and integration on flight hardware.

This hands-on role emphasizes end-to-end ownership of boards, subsystems, and interfaces, collaborating with software, mechanical, and systems engineers to ensure flight-ready reliability.

Qualifications

• BS or MS in Electrical/Computer Engineering or related field.
• 5+ years designing electrical/avionics hardware through full lifecycle.
• Strong EE design: schematic capture and PCB for complex boards.
• Hands-on board bring-up: firmware flashing, interface testing, bench debugging.
• Experience with CAN/SPI/I2C/UART; Linux toolchains for hardware bring-up.

Responsibilities

• Own avionics hardware lifecycle from concept to flight-ready integration.
• Design flight computers and support boards with processors, memory, and interfaces.
• Select and integrate MCUs/SoCs, FPGAs, memories, sensors, and transceivers.
• Define board interfaces and buses: CAN, SPI, I2C, UART, Ethernet, SpaceWire.
• Develop ICDs for connections to GNC, power, propulsion and payload subsystems.
• Bring up boards in lab, write test firmware, debug hardware issues.
• Collaborate with embedded software to integrate drivers and health monitoring.
• Contribute to power architecture, protections, and load management.
• Apply design-for-test and design-for-reliability principles for flight qualification.

Skills

Schematic capture

PCB design

Embedded systems

CAN bus

SPI

I2C

UART

C/C++

Python

FPGA

Education

B.S. or M.S. in Electrical Engineering or Computer Engineering

Tools

Oscilloscopes

Logic analyzers

Lab instrumentation

Job description

Fortastra Corporation is seeking a Sr. Avionics Engineer to design and deliver spacecraft avionics hardware and embedded systems through the full product lifecycle—from concept and architecture to PCB bring-up and integration on flight hardware.

This hands-on role emphasizes end-to-end ownership of boards, subsystems, and interfaces, collaborating with software, mechanical, and systems engineers to ensure flight-ready reliability.