Sr Flight Software Engineer – Autonomous & Intelligent System Management, AI - Space Systems Development

At Blue Origin, we envision millions of people living and working in space for the benefit of Earth. We’re working to develop reusable, safe, and low-cost space vehicles and systems within a culture of safety, collaboration, and inclusion. Join our diverse team of problem solvers as we add new chapters to the history of spaceflight!  

We are a team with wide-ranging skillsets that value safety, problem-solving and diversity. These positions will directly impact the history of space exploration and will require your commitment and detailed attention towards safe space flight. Join us in enabling Blue Origin’s vision of millions of people living and working in space to benefit Earth.

This position is part of the Space Systems Development (SSD) business unit. SSD is Blue Origin’s advanced development arm dedicated to developing mission architectures, creating, and feeding new technologies into our existing offerings, building our next generation of leaders, and commercializing new platforms that fuel Blue Origin’s growth and further its mission. Our work scope is broad and deep, forging the path toward our vision of millions of people living and working in space.

As part of a diverse and hardworking team of engineers and technicians within the Space System Development (SSD) business unit, you will contribute to the design of the flight software intelligent system for future space systems operating in orbital and deep space environment. Within a small, passionate, and accomplished team, you will contribute to developing intelligent fault tolerant flight software responsible for the overall command and control of a significant autonomous space system providing state-of-the-art space station services with Blue Origin Orbital Reef and NASA Commercial Destination Free Flyer (CDFF) program. This includes defining architectures and requirements, cross-functional activities with subsystem stakeholders, development and verification, and edge artificial intelligence modalities. This position will directly impact the history of space exploration, and your dedicated commitment and detailed attention will further the cause of safe spaceflight as we build a road to space. You will create and maintain artifacts for flight software designs and present infrastructure, application, intelligent flight software designs at gated reviews.

We are looking for engineers to apply their technical expertise, leadership skills, and commitment to quality to positively impact safe human spaceflight. Passion for our mission and vision is required. If you’re excited by solving novel problems, learning about interesting topics, and completing challenging activities, please apply!

Responsibilities:

· Design and develop vehicle autonomous system management and fault management flight software

· Support design and development of flight software functional architecture for orbital space system

· Support design and integration of edge Artificial Intelligence modalities into embedded flight software architecture

· Design and Develop specialized embedded Intelligent software, computer vision software for autonomous and semiautonomous operations, including system management, robotics, proximity, docking, and payload operations

· Evaluate, decompose, and create requirements for safety-critical, real-time operating systems

· Support trade studies for infrastructure, system and application embedded flight software architectures and implementations

· Work with cross-functional stakeholders to define software concepts of operations, functions and requirements, including robotics, proximity and docking fiducials,

· Author unit tests, documentation, and participate in design and code reviews

· Integrate space system flight software components, create and run unit tests, validate on cross-platform software testbed Hardware-in-the-Loop and simulator environment

· Integrate and deploy specialized AI modalities into edge spacecraft software for designated autonomous and semiautonomous system management and operations

· Define and implement intelligent system flight software engineering best practices and processes through edge deployment for embedded real-time execution

· Present flight software designs at design and milestone reviews

· Deliver flight software for milestone prototype demonstration

· Support the integrated product manager to identify and track program and technical risk, develop and maintain schedule, resource allocation, and budget

Qualifications:

· B.S./M.S. degree in computer science, intelligent robotics, Artificial Intelligence, applied mathematics, or related field, with 10 year demonstrated industry experience.

· Breadth and depth of understanding of real-time embedded software development concepts

· Demonstrated software development skills in real-time embedded systems, particularly in C/C++

· Demonstrated depth in theoretical and applied experience with first-hand implementation of specialized foundational AI/ML/ODML/CV/SLM within resource-constrained embedded system on the edge for native and on-premise inference

· Experience in cross-platform development and deployment of software.

· Experience with real time operating systems

· Demonstrated hands-on and theoretical mastery of software, computational science and intelligent system principles, concepts, algorithms, and engineering beyond tool use

· Demonstrated experience with development of real-time embedded software systems performing long duration autonomous operations in changing environments

· Advanced competency in both real-time embedded software control systems and application software engineering across the entire lifecycle

· Demonstrated competency and experience developing intelligent systems, Artificial Intelligence and computer vision software for real-time embedded systems at the edge

· Highly skilled in both software architecture and computer architecture

· Demonstrated theoretical and applied experience with intelligent system computational concepts and processes

· Effective communication skills

· Must be a U.S. citizen or national, U.S. permanent resident (current Green Card holder), or lawfully admitted into the U.S. as a refugee or granted asylum.

Desired:

· M.S.+ degree in computer science, intelligent robotics, Artificial Intelligence, applied mathematics, or related field

· Successful Candidates typically have 8 to 10+ years of real-time embedded flight software design and development experience.

· Extensive experience in autonomous system real-time embedded software development for aerospace, satellite, self-driving automotive, robotics, naval underwater vehicles, medical systems, or edge autonomous planning and scheduling systems.

· Extensive experience in full life cycle software development of real-time embedded system, including system design and analysis, requirement capture and development, software implementation and verification, system integration, qualification, and release.

· Experience with dynamic iterative development processes such as spiral model, agile, or incremental models

· Experience with real time operating systems

· Ability to translate intelligent system concepts, architecture, and design to implementable software within the constraints of safety and mission critical real-time embedded systems in C/C++

· Ability to implement advanced intelligent software not supported by prepackaged libraries

· Experience with prepackaged libraries such as OpenCV, LiteRT, TensorFlow Lite, PyTorch, Keras, Numpy, Python, scikit-learn

· Experience and knowledge with edge processing accelerator engines and runtime engines for inference, computer vision and sensor fusion algorithms computation

· Demonstrated theoretical and applied depth of experience with intelligent system foundational computational concepts for search, inference/AI/ML/CV/SLM/VLM/ transformers

· Experience with intelligent system edge integration and deployment for native execution within resource-constrained on-premise edge embedded system

· Experience with cross-platform development and testbed lab environments

· Experience developing safety and mission critical products adhering to software best practices and standards such as DO-178, NPR 7150.2, or other.

· Experience working effectively with cross-functional stakeholders

 

Compensation Range for:

CA applicants is $170,805.00-$239,127.00;CO applicants is $157,053.75-$219,875.25;WA applicants is $170,805.00-$239,127.00

Other site ranges may differ

Applications will be accepted on an ongoing basis until the requisition is closed.

Inclusivity Statement

Don’t meet all desired requirements? Studies have shown that some people are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every single desired qualification. At Blue Origin, we are dedicated to building a diverse, inclusive, and authentic workplace, so if you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every desired qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles.

Export Control Regulations

Applicants for employment at Blue Origin must be a U.S. citizen or national, U.S. permanent resident (i.e. current Green Card holder), or lawfully admitted into the U.S. as a refugee or granted asylum.

Benefits

Benefits include:  Medical, dental, vision, basic and supplemental life insurance, paid parental leave, short and long-term disability, 401(k) with a company match of up to 5%, and an Education Support Program.

Paid Time Off:  Up to four (4) weeks per year based on weekly scheduled hours, and up to 14 company-paid holidays.

Discretionary bonus: Bonuses are designed to reward individual contributions as well as allow employees to share in company results.

Eligibility for benefits varies by role type, please check with your recruiter for a comprehensive list of the benefits available for this role.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Blue Origin is proud to be an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer and is committed to attracting, retaining, and developing a highly qualified, diverse, and dedicated work force. Blue Origin hires and promotes people on the basis of their qualifications, performance, and abilities. We support the establishment and maintenance of a workplace that fosters trust, equality, and teamwork, in which all employees recognize and appreciate the diversity of individual team members. We provide all qualified applicants for employment and employees with equal opportunities for hire, promotion, and other terms and conditions of employment, regardless of their race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin/ethnicity, age, physical or mental disability, genetic factors, military/veteran status, or any other status or characteristic protected by federal, state, and/or local law. Blue Origin will consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with applicable federal, state, and local laws, including the Washington Fair Chance Act, the California Fair Chance Act, the Los Angeles Fair Chance in Hiring Ordinance, and other applicable laws. For more information on “EEO Is the Law,” please see here.

Affirmative Action and Disability Accommodation

Applicants wishing to receive information on Blue Origin’s Affirmative Action Plans, or applicants requiring a reasonable accommodation in order to participate in the application and/or interview process, please contact us at EEOCompliance@blueorigin.com.

California Applicant Privacy Notice

If you are a California resident, please reference the CA Applicant Privacy Notice here.