Principal Software Engineer

Principal Software Engineer

Rocket Lab Optical Systems solves mission-critical space domain and Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance challenges for Department of Defense and Intelligence Community customers. Our vision is to revolutionize the space-based payload market with innovative and novel designs for space, terrestrial, and airborne environments. Building on more than 20 years of electro-optical and infrared systems innovation from Geost, Rocket Lab Optical Systems delivers solutions to the warfighter for responsive, scalable sensing solutions across all orbital domains.

As a Principal Software Engineer for Rocket Lab Optical Systems in Chantilly, VA, you will design flight software in support of spacecraft for Tranche 3 of the U.S. Space Development Agency's Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture.

What You'll Get To Do:

• Play a key role supporting the development of payload flight software for our Space Systems programs.
• Focus on deployment of novel algorithms into austere environments on Size/Weight/Power constrained sensor systems.
• Lead cross-functional teams to define technical requirements and deliver integrated solutions.
• Provide technical leadership in all aspects of software design and development starting with requirements generation and following through implementation, testing, deployment.
• Define and influence software architecture, design patterns, interfaces, and technical standards to ensure scalable, maintainable, and extensible solutions.
• Drive core software fundamentals of performance-oriented programming leveraging a variety of accelerator technologies.
• Mentor engineers across experience levels, provide technical guidance, and foster a culture of engineering excellence and continuous improvement.
• Support technical planning, effort estimation, risk identification, dependency management, and milestone delivery while communicating technical status and risks to stakeholders.
• Be part of a team of driven pioneers relentlessly tackling challenging projects, delivering on the impossible, and making an impact on the future of space.

You'll Bring These Qualifications As Principal Software Engineer:

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, computer engineering.
• 12+ years of experience in embedded software engineering experience.
• Experience in designing complex multithreaded application.
• Experience designing flight software.
• Ability to obtain and maintain an U.S. Government security clearance.

These Qualifications Would Be Nice To Have:

• Familiarity with high-performance and parallel processing.
• Exposure to novel architectures including FPGA, CUDA, etc.
• Familiarity with flight software system management.
• Experience with algorithm implementation.
• Exposure to Python and MATLAB is highly desired.
• Familiarity with numerical computing principles.