Senior Process Development Chemist

voyagertechnologiesinc; Pueblo (CO); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Voyager Technologies in Colorado is building advanced space, defense, and national security solutions. The Senior Process Development Chemist owns the development and characterization of Voyager's chemical processes at laboratory scale, designing experiments that build fundamental process understanding to move safely from bench to plant alongside the chemical engineers.

This onsite role will implement DoE, assess hazards, and produce data packages; the position reports to the Chief Engineer and

Qualifications

• MS in chemistry or related field.
• 5+ years in process development or process scale-up.
• Demonstrated proficiency designing and applying DoE to define operating windows.
• Hands-on crystallization and purification process development.
• Experience assessing reaction and thermal hazards.
• Experience transferring a process from lab to pilot or production; reporting/data packages.

Responsibilities

• Design and execute bench-scale experiments to characterize reaction kinetics, thermodynamics, crystallization behavior, impurity rejection, and pH/buffer control.
• Apply DoE to define operating windows and critical quality attributes.
• Characterize reaction and thermal hazards to support safe scale-up.
• Ensure designs are scale-relevant across vessel sizes.
• Produce data packages to transfer process understanding to engineering.
• Collaborate with chemical engineering to close data gaps surfaced during design and scale-up.
• Contribute to safe laboratory operations and waste minimization.

Skills

DoE design

Scale-up

Crystallization

Purification

Data reporting

Hazard analysis

Technical communication

Education

MS in chemistry or related field

Tools

PAT instruments

Chromatography

Job description

Voyager is an innovative space, defense, and national security technology company committed to advancing and delivering transformative, mission-critical solutions. We tackle the most complex challenges to unlock new frontiers for human progress, fortify national security, and protect critical assets to lead in the race for technological and operational superiority from ground to space.

Forge the Future: Join Voyager Technologies

The future belongs to those who build it. At Voyager Technologies, we're building technologies that protect lives, expand frontiers and prepare us for what's next. And we're doing that with people who are wired to solve, build, adapt and lead. These roles are not for the faint of heart.

You’ll help lay the foundation for humanity's future. Join a culture where innovation thrives, curiosity is rewarded, and impact is real. We’re a company of doers, thinkers and builders, united by purpose and grounded in reality.

If you want to put your skills to work where the stakes are real and the mission is bigger than any one person, forge the future with Voyager.

The Senior Process Development Chemist

owns the development and characterization of Voyager's chemical processes at laboratory scale by building fundamental process understanding. This includes investigation of reaction kinetics and thermodynamics, crystallization behavior, impurity rejection, and operating windows. The resulting data package forms the core starting point that engineering relies on to move each process safely and efficiently from bench to plant. This is not a role where you optimize conditions in isolation and hand off a number, but rather one where you design experiments that anticipate how a process will behave at scale and work iteratively alongside the chemical engineers who translate that data into production equipment. With facilities for oxidizers, energetic materials, and energetic precursors planned across Colorado and Louisiana in the coming years, this is also an opportunity to shape how process development is done from the ground up. As the first dedicated hire in this function, you could grow into building and leading a team as operations expand, though a strong individual contributor will find deep and meaningful work here from day one.

The position reports to the Chief Engineer and is part of the Chemicals and Explosives Team. This fully onsite role is based in Penrose, CO with a shift to Pueblo, CO expected within the next year. The two sites are about 40 miles apart and within the same Colorado Springs/Pueblo commuting area.

In this role, the essential functions are:

• Designing and executing bench-scale experiments (~100g-10kg) to characterize reaction kinetics/thermodynamics, crystallization behavior (nucleation, growth, seeding, thermal and supersaturation profiles), impurity rejection, and pH/buffer control
• Applying Design of Experiments (DoE) to define process operating windows, critical process parameters, and critical quality attributes
• Characterizing reaction and thermal hazards (heat of reaction, onset temperature, gas evolution, thermal stability) to support safe scale-up
• Ensuring experimental designs and results are scale-relevant, accounting for how mixing, heat transfer, and mass transfer change with vessel size
• Producing documented data packages that transfer process understanding and defined parameters to the engineering team
• Collaborating iteratively with chemical engineering - designing targeted experiments to close data gaps surfaced during process design and scale-up
• Contributing to safe laboratory operations, including reagent/solvent selection, chemical inventory maintenance, and waste handling and minimization

Basic Qualifications:

• M.S. in chemistry (physical, inorganic, organic, organometallic, analytical), chemical engineering, or related physical science
• 5+ years of experience in process development, process chemistry, or process scale-up
• Demonstrated proficiency designing and executing DoE to define operating windows and characterize factor interactions
• Hands-on experience developing crystallization and purification/separation processes while applying fundamental principles of particle engineering
• Hands-on experience assessing reaction and thermal hazards (e.g. calorimetry, thermal stability measurement, gas analysis)
• Track record of transferring a process from lab to pilot or production, including authoring the supporting reports and data packages
• Ability to communicate technical results in writing and presentation to both chemistry and engineering audiences

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with safely synthesizing, handling, and evaluating oxidizers and energetic materials
• Experience with process analytical technology (PAT) tools such as particle analyzers (e.g. FBRM), electrochemical analyzers (e.g. pH, ORP), and spectroscopic analyzers (e.g. FTIR, NIR, Raman), as well as offline analytical techniques such as chromatography (e.g. IC, GC)
• Travel,