Spacecraft Manufacturing Engineer: Scale High-Rate Production

Apex Space, Inc.; Los Angeles (CA); Hybrid; USD 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

100% company-paid healthcare

PTO 15–20 days + 10 holidays

401(k) match

8 weeks parental leave

Daily catered lunch

Playa Vista office

Career impact

Job summary

Apex Space, Inc. in Playa Vista, CA seeks a Spacecraft Build Engineer to scale manufacturing processes and tooling for high-rate spacecraft builds.

You’ll own how hardware is built, integrated, and transitioned into production, collaborating across propulsion, avionics, and structures to improve manufacturability, yield, and throughput. The role requires a Bachelor’s in mechanical, aerospace, or related engineering and 3+ years in hardware manufacturing, with CAD tooling experience and a DFMA

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in mechanical, aerospace, manufacturing, or related engineering field.
• 3+ years of experience in manufacturing, production, or process engineering for complex hardware systems.
• Experience with manufacturing process development and high-rate production environments.
• Hands-on experience with assembly, integration, or testing of mechanical or aerospace systems.
• Ability to troubleshoot and resolve production issues in fast-paced environments.

Responsibilities

• Own the development and qualification of manufacturing processes for spacecraft components and assemblies
• Design and implement precision tooling and fixtures to improve quality, repeatability, and cycle time
• Drive high-rate production by optimizing processes, reducing takt time, and increasing throughput
• Develop and automate manufacturing and inspection processes to improve yield and consistency
• Lead the transition of hardware from development into production environments
• Partner with design engineers to drive design for manufacturability (DFM/DFMA)
• Troubleshoot manufacturing and integration issues and drive corrective actions
• Simplify requirements and processes to reduce complexity, cost, and build time
• Support production scaling, factory layout, and manufacturing system development

Skills

3+ years manufacturing experience

Tooling & fixture design

DFM/DFMA

Assembly/Integration/testing

Cross-functional ownership

Education

Bachelor’s degree in mechanical, aerospace, manufacturing, or materials engineering

Master’s degree (nice to have)

Tools

CAD (SolidWorks, NX)

Job description

Apex Space, Inc. in Playa Vista, CA seeks a Spacecraft Build Engineer to scale manufacturing processes and tooling for high-rate spacecraft builds.

You’ll own how hardware is built, integrated, and transitioned into production, collaborating across propulsion, avionics, and structures to improve manufacturability, yield, and throughput. The role requires a Bachelor’s in mechanical, aerospace, or related engineering and 3+ years in hardware manufacturing, with CAD tooling experience and a DFMA