Senior Technical Program Manager — High-Volume Satellite Production

Rocket Lab USA; Long Beach (CA); On-site; USD 134,000 - 201,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

401(k) matching

Stock purchase program

Paid vacation and holidays

Onsite gym

Job summary

Rocket Lab USA in Long Beach, CA is seeking a Senior Technical Program Manager II for flat satellite production. You will own rate, yield, unit cost, and strategic decisions from prototype through full-rate production, leading teams and making architectural calls with senior engineers.

You will coordinate multiple active programs, drive DFM and manufacturing efficiency, and build a bench of leaders while managing subcontractors and suppliers to protect schedule and margin.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in physics, math, science, or other technical discipline.
• 8+ years of program management experience.
• Proven track record owning a technical program, product, or team end to end under pressure.
• Experience moving hardware/software from prototype to high-rate production with quantified gains.
• Understanding takt time, line-of-balance, DFM, and learning-curve economics.
• Experience identifying tooling, supply-chain, or yield risk and neutralizing it.
• U.S. citizenship with ability to obtain/maintain security clearance.

Responsibilities

• Lead high-volume satellite production programs from prototype to flight.
• Make architectural calls with Chief Engineers and manage trade-offs in manufacturing.
• Drive cross-functional execution across manufacturing, supply chain, integration, and test.
• Partner with BD & Strategy on proposals and technical narratives for constellation production.
• Own the technical roadmap to grow core team capabilities and yield improvements.
• Manage high-stakes subcontracts and supplier relationships.

Skills

Program management

Leadership

Systems engineering

Design-for-manufacturing

Risk management

Security clearance readiness

Education

Bachelor’s degree in physics, math, science, or technical discipline

Master’s degree in Engineering/Operations or related field

Tools

Jira

Confluence

ERP/MRP systems

Job description

Rocket Lab USA in Long Beach, CA is seeking a Senior Technical Program Manager II for flat satellite production. You will own rate, yield, unit cost, and strategic decisions from prototype through full-rate production, leading teams and making architectural calls with senior engineers.

You will coordinate multiple active programs, drive DFM and manufacturing efficiency, and build a bench of leaders while managing subcontractors and suppliers to protect schedule and margin.