Mission Lead Systems Engineer

About The Role
Muon seeks a Mission Lead Systems Engineer to join our Mission Engineering team in Mountain View, CA. At Muon, we are developing multiple missions to help understand and act on climate impacts. As a Mission Lead Systems Engineer, you will serve as the technical lead for a specific Muon mission, owning the end-to-end technical success from concept through on-orbit operations. You will be the primary technical interface with customers for your mission. In this role you will have a "big-picture" view of mission execution, spanning the full lifecycle of mission design - from initial formulation with the Business Development team, through execution with the space vehicle hardware and software teams, to on-orbit validation and mission performance monitoring with the Operations team. You will be responsible for interacting with customers and cross functional team leads to develop requirements and ICDs, work with other Systems Engineers to perform system modeling, develop test plans with AI&T teams, and identify and reduce risk across the program with Program Managers.

Muon is a lean and agile team, so keys to success in this role are your ability to "right-size" analysis and processes for differing levels of system maturity and risk, your flexibility to work with changing demands and schedules, and your effective communication of technical content to a diverse audience.

Responsibilities

• Serve as the ultimate technical authority for your designated mission, leading the conceptualization, design, and development of the mission. Drive critical cross-functional technical trades and decisions to ensure mission success.
• Lead the tailoring and implementation of the Muon mission design process for your designated mission, ensuring alignment with program needs, while contributing to process refinement across all missions.
• Own the translation of customer objectives and stakeholder needs into clear, verifiable, and actionable technical requirements for your designated mission.
• Serve as the primary technical point of contact for your designated mission, interfacing with customers, partners, and internal stakeholders on all technical matters.
• Manage requirements traceability, verification, and validation
• Define mission CONOPS and manage subsystem budgets (e.g., power, data, mass, pointing/stability)
• Identify and mitigate internal and external mission risks, communicating impacts effectively
• Assess and coordinate design changes across disciplines throughout the program lifecycle
• Lead design, test readiness, and flight readiness reviews
• Monitor on-orbit spacecraft and data pipelines to ensure mission success and that customer requirements are met
• Foster deep collaboration with and provide technical direction to systems, hardware, software, data, ground segment, and operations teams for your designated mission, and support these interactions across other missions.
• Effectively serve as the Mission Lead Systems Engineer for one mission while contributing general systems engineering expertise and support to other Muon missions, potentially deputizing for other Mission Lead Systems Engineers as needed.
• Contribute to the continuous improvement of engineering processes, tools, and methodologies to enhance efficiency and effectiveness in mission development and operations

Qualifications

• M.S. or higher degree in an engineering field plus 8 years of experience working in a multi-disciplinary environment, preferably with exposure to mission design, spacecraft systems, and remote sensing instruments/pipelines
• Prior experience as a Mission Lead Systems Engineer or in a similar senior technical leadership role for a significant portion of a satellite mission.
• Extensive experience system modeling, systems analysis, and running simulations
• Proven history of system integration and delivery of complex systems
• Experience managing requirements for a multi-disciplinary project
• Demonstrated project management skills and ability to collaborate with other engineering disciplines
• Excellent communication, presentation, and coordination skills
• Ability to rapidly change roles/responsibilities while working in a high-paced, rewarding work environment

Nice-to-have Skills

• Experience directly interfacing with and managing expectations for external customers (e.g., government, commercial).
• Software skills in Python or Julia
• Remote sensing instrument experience across multiple modalities (e.g. optical, multispectral, RF), and their associated data pipelines
• Knowledge of industry standards for electrical and/or software quality practices
• Familiarity with software engineering tools and processes (version control, code review)

Salary
The salary range for this role is $179,000 - $208,000 and will depend on a candidate's skills, geographic location, qualifications, and experience as defined during the interview process.

About Muon Space
Founded in 2021, Muon Space is an end-to-end Space Systems Provider that designs, builds, and operates LEO satellite constellations delivering mission-critical data. Our revolutionary, integrated technology stack enables customers to optimize every dimension of their missions for faster time-to-orbit and superior constellation remote sensing performance. Our state-of-the-art facility in the heart of Silicon Valley is optimized for manufacturing spacecraft and rapid, flexible payload integration at scale. From climate monitoring to national security, Muon Space is dedicated to delivering Earth Intelligence for a safer and more resilient world.

Taking Care of Our Team

At Muon salary is only part of our total compensation package. In addition to salary, we provide equity compensation as well as benefits including medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401k retirement plan, short & long term disability and life insurance. We also offer three weeks paid vacation for new employees, along with 12 paid holidays, unlimited sick time and paid parental leave.

Our mission embraces the entire planet and we believe our team should too. Muon is dedicated to creating a diverse and dynamic company and workforce. We believe in equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, age, national origin, citizenship, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, or gender identity. We value diversity in the workplace, and that starts with our applicants. We encourage you to apply, even if you don't check all the boxes, and we look forward to reviewing your application In addition, if you need a reasonable accommodation as part of your application for employment or interviews with us, please let us know.

ITAR/EAR Requirements
This position requires access to export controlled information. To conform to U.S. Government export regulations applicable to that information, applicant must either be (A) a U.S. person, defined as a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (green card holder), (iii) refugee under 8 U.S.C.

• 1157, or (iv) asylee under 8 U.S.C.
• 1158, (B) eligible to access the export controlled information without a required export authorization, or (C) eligible and reasonably likely to obtain the required export authorization from the applicable U.S. government agency. The Company may, for legitimate business reasons, decline to pursue any export licensing process.