Senior Spacecraft Mission Software Engineer (Ground Ops)

Vardaspace; El Segundo (CA); On-site; USD 169,000 - 216,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity options

Relocation assistance

On-site facilities

Job summary

Varda Space Industries in El Segundo, CA is seeking an experienced Mission Software Engineer to own and advance ground segment software, telemetry ingestion, and mission control interfaces. You will design, implement, and productionize software across CI/CD pipelines, collaborating with avionics, GNC, and operations teams to enable reliable spacecraft operations on-site in California.

The role requires 5+ years in safety-critical spacecraft software, strong Python skills, and experience with

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, math, physics, engineering or equivalent technical experience in safety critical software.
• 5+ years of experience in the development of spacecraft or similar safety critical software.
• Expertise with development in Python, along with a strong understanding of the language concepts.
• Have strong systems fundamentals: concurrency, networking, performance, reliability.
• Experience building real-time data acquisition, scaling, and distribution services - low-latency messaging, time-series and relational stores.
• Hands‑on experience with CI/CD, dependency/build systems, and infrastructure-as-code.
• End-to-end observability experience: logging, metrics, tracing.
• Docker/Kubernetes; release management, phased rollouts, and operational readiness for controlled networks.

Responsibilities

• Own Ground Segment Services: Develop and maintain high-reliability services for telemetry ingestion, scaling, distribution, and commanding.
• Mission Control Interfaces: Deliver operator-grade UIs and dashboards that optimize 'ops time' and reduce cognitive load.
• Simulation and Test Automation: Build tools to run flight-software simulations, device emulators, and automated tests.
• Build the Mission Platform: Design, implement, and productionize software for mission and ground teams; standardize CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure-as-code.
• Deployments Across Environments: Create robust deployment patterns for lab benches, test stands, and mission networks.

Skills

Python

Concurrency

Networking

Performance

Reliability

RT data services

CI/CD

Observability

Infrastructure-as-code

Flight software concepts

Education

Bachelor's degree in computer science, math, physics, engineering or equivalent technical experience in safety critical software

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

Job description

Varda Space Industries in El Segundo, CA is seeking an experienced Mission Software Engineer to own and advance ground segment software, telemetry ingestion, and mission control interfaces. You will design, implement, and productionize software across CI/CD pipelines, collaborating with avionics, GNC, and operations teams to enable reliable spacecraft operations on-site in California.

The role requires 5+ years in safety-critical spacecraft software, strong Python skills, and experience with