Stage Development Engineer II, Vehicle Build

Relativity Space; Long Beach (CA); On-site; USD 109,000 - 163,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary and equity

PTO & sick leave

Parental leave

Learning and development stipend

Job summary

Relativity Space is seeking a motivated engineer for the Vehicle Build team to help integrate Terran R components and drive cross-functional collaboration across propulsion, manufacturing, software, avionics, and corporate functions.

You will own verification activities, balance constraints, and guide test campaigns to ensure quality and performance of the vehicle lifecycle, while enabling scalable manufacturing and rapid decision making.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering or related field.
• 2+ years of relevant experience in aerospace/engineering.
• Strong problem-solving skills and ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.
• Technical aptitude with understanding across Mechanical, Fluids, and Avionics disciplines.

Responsibilities

• Own the scope of verification activities for Integration, test, and launch site checkouts.
• Balance technical, cost, and schedule constraints; weigh options and propose solutions.
• Drive systems through qualification, acceptance, and hotfire test campaigns by writing/reviewing test objectives, matrices, and plans.
• Enable manufacturing teams to scale by owning specific off-nominal work scope.
• Collaborate across teams to design, build, test, fly, recover, and reuse Terran R.

Skills

Problem-solving

Multi-priority management

Interdisciplinary aptitude

Education

Bachelor's degree in engineering or related field

Job description

At Relativity Space, we’re building rockets to serve today’s needs and tomorrow’s breakthroughs. Our Terran R vehicle will deliver customer payloads to orbit, meeting the growing demand for launch capacity. But that’s just the start. Achieving commercial success with Terran R will unlock new opportunities to advance science, exploration, and innovation, pioneering progress that reaches beyond the known.

Joining Relativity means becoming part of something where autonomy, ownership, and impact exist at every level. Here, you're not just executing tasks; you're solving problems that haven’t been solved before, helping develop a rocket, a factory, and a business from the ground up. Whether you’re in propulsion, manufacturing, software, avionics, or a corporate function, you’ll collaborate across teams, shape decisions, and see your work come to life in record time. Relativity is a place where creativity and technical rigor go hand in hand, and your voice will help define the stories we’re writing together. Now is a unique moment in time where it’s early enough to leave your mark on the product, the process, and the culture, but far enough along that Terran R is tangible and picking up momentum. The most meaningful work of your career is waiting. Join us.

About The Team

The Systems Engineering team ensures that Terran R comes together as a cohesive, high-performing, and scalable system. Within the department, one team focuses on building tools and processes to manage requirements, track decisions, and identify and mitigate risk - enabling faster, more informed development across the program. Engineers work across domains to understand complex problems, identify solutions, and implement them - all with deep technical knowledge, not just documentation. The other team focuses on the vehicle itself, working across teams to ensure all subsystems of Terran R function together as intended, burning down technical risk, and driving informed decisions at every stage of the vehicle lifecycle. Engineers are empowered to lead high-impact efforts, from major test campaigns to console operations during launch, and are trusted to drive improvements across fluids, structures, avionics, and more. Regardless of which team you’re on, you’ll be part of a high-visibility, high-impact department at a pivotal moment in the program, where decisions made today on trades, architecture, and process will shape not just the first launch, but the long‑term trajectory of Relativity.

About The Role

The Vehicle Build team at Relativity Space is a small, dynamic group within the Vehicle Engineering organization, specializing in cross-functional vehicle development, designing for operability, defining Concept of Operations for downstream work centers, and determining vehicle verification activities. Our team acts as the engineering focal point throughout the vehicle's lifecycle, ensuring consistency in the vehicle build process. We manage upstream and downstream impacts, excel at addressing complex problems, and solving new build challenges. Our group solves for balance between performance, launch/build rate, and reliability. This involves determining requirements, verification events, tools, guidance, and processes, all with operability at the forefront. On this team, you’ll collaborate with every function across the company to help design, build, test, fly, recover, and reuse Terran R. You will:

• Balance technical, cost, and schedule constraints; weighing options, investigating scenarios, and proposing solutions
• Owning the scope of verification activities for Integration, test, and launch site checkouts
• Follow the vehicle through its life cycle to ensure consistency in quality and process
• Drive systems through qualification, acceptance, and hotfire test campaigns by writing/reviewing test objectives, test matrices, and test plans
• Enable manufacturing teams to scale by owning specific off-nominal work scope
• Ability to travel to our test & launch sites and may additionally require shifted schedules or weekend work for critical milestones

About You

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering or related field and 2+ years of relevant experience
• Problem-solving skills and the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment
• Technical aptitude and basic understanding of all functional disciplines (Mechanical, Fluids, and Avionics)

Nice To Haves But Not Required

• Graduate degree in engineering or related field
• Experience with aerospace ERP systems and writing technical planning
• Proven experience in design, manufacturing, assembly, and testing of complex aerospace systems
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to distill complex technical problems into simple concepts for a broader audience
• Leadership or coordination experience in a multidisciplinary engineering project and demonstrated ability to lead by influence and collaborate with technical owners

At Relativity Space, we are committed to transparency and fairness in our compensation practices. Actual compensation will be determined based on experience, qualifications, and other job-related factors.

Compensation is only one part of our total rewards package. Relativity Space offers competitive salary and equity, a generous PTO and sick leave policy, parental leave, an annual learning and development stipend, and more! To see some of the benefits & perks we offer, please visit here.

Hiring Range

$109,000 - $163,000 USD

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

If you need a reasonable accommodation, please contact us at [e-mail].