Senior Hall-Effect Propulsion Engineer – Flight-Ready EP

Telemetry Today LLC; Los Angeles (CA); On-site; USD 140,000 - 200,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity in Apex

Company-paid healthcare

Comprehensive PTO

401(k) with matching

Parental leave

Daily catered lunch

Vibrant Playa Vista office

Real impact opportunity

Job summary

Apex Technology, Inc. is seeking a Senior Electric Propulsion Engineer with deep expertise in Hall-effect thrusters to own the design, development, qualification, and production of Hall thruster technology for our electric propulsion systems.

This senior IC role will drive key design decisions and life-qualification campaigns while partnering with propulsion engineers to scale EP production. You will own end-to-end thruster development from plasma physics to manufacturing, with opportunities to

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in aerospace, mechanical, electrical, plasma/propulsion engineering, applied physics, or related field.
• 6+ years of relevant electric propulsion experience with Bachelor's or Master's, OR a Ph.D. with 3+ years of industry experience.
• Deep hands-on knowledge of Hall thruster physics and design, including discharge channel design, magnetic circuit layout, anode and gas distribution, cathode coupling, and thermal management.
• Experience planning and executing Hall thruster or EP test campaigns in vacuum facilities, including diagnostics, performance measurement, and life testing.
• Knowledge of degradation mechanisms (erosion, thermal limits, discharge instabilities) and designing/tests around them.
• Experience owning hardware through design, development, build, and test.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end design and development of Hall-effect thrusters (discharge channel geometry, magnetic circuit, anode/gas distributor, thermal packaging).
• Develop plasma physics and performance models to drive thruster design (ionization, acceleration, magnetic topology, efficiency, thrust-to-power, ISP).
• Define and execute thruster test and life-qualification campaigns (performance mapping, plume characterization, thermal testing, wear testing).
• Develop erosion and life models to demonstrate mission life and propulsion budgets.
• Drive cathode-thruster coupling and EP system integration with related subsystems.
• Select materials and processes and qualify them for spaceflight and scalable production.
• Optimize thruster designs for performance, mass, cost, manufacturability; develop work instructions and production procedures.

Skills

Hall thruster design

Plasma physics

Test campaigns

System integration

Requirements decomposition

Education

Bachelor's degree in relevant field

PhD in electric propulsion or related field

Tools

Plasma simulation tools (PIC/Hybrid)

Job description

Apex Technology, Inc. is seeking a Senior Electric Propulsion Engineer with deep expertise in Hall-effect thrusters to own the design, development, qualification, and production of Hall thruster technology for our electric propulsion systems.

This senior IC role will drive key design decisions and life-qualification campaigns while partnering with propulsion engineers to scale EP production. You will own end-to-end thruster development from plasma physics to manufacturing, with opportunities to