Head​/VP of Engineering

Subcritical Systems, Inc. is a venture-backed startup in Austin, Texas building the accelerator driven systems and the only US commercial manufacturer of accelerator cavities. What Space X did for rockets, we plan to do for accelerator cavities and commercialize across applications of power production, medical isotopes, semiconductors and waste transmutation.

We are in the process of building the Energy Amplifier — a novel nuclear fission system in which a particle accelerator drives a subcritical core, making melting physically impossible for clean power production. Due to its inherent safety, our system has a more streamlined licensing process. Our founding team includes successful entrepreneurs with a track record of building several multibillion dollar companies in deep-tech, and scientists who were leading U.S. National labs with deep experience in accelerator & nuclear technologies.

We are actively hiring to expand our team as we work toward licensing, regulatory submissions, and construction of our first energy amplifier. More information is available at

The Head/VP of Engineering will build and lead Subcritical Systems’ engineering execution organization. You will sit at the center of execution, translating architecture into buildable systems, forcing clarity at subsystem boundaries, and driving the program to physical hardware and validated data.

The VP of Engineering works from system specifications and design basis inputs produced by the CTO’s design team and is accountable for turning those inputs into complete, fabrication-ready engineering designs. This leader also owns the systems engineering framework:
Subcritical Systems has a high-level SE framework in place, and the Head/VP of Engineering will be responsible for building it out into a fully operational process that governs requirements traceability, interface management, configuration control, and design reviews across the program.

The right candidate is a hands‑on engineering leader who has built teams that deliver detailed design packages for complex hardware, has grown a systems engineering process in a working program, and is energized by standing something up from scratch in a startup environment.

• Recruit, hire, and develop a multidisciplinary team of engineers and CAD designers; establish team structure, roles, and design standards.
• Assess the existing engineering toolset, CAD platform, PDM/PLM, and supporting tools, and evolve it as the team and program scale, ensuring it remains fit for an advanced energy system and program.
• Set engineering culture: rigorous documentation standards, clear design ownership, and a fabrication-first mindset.

• Translate the architecture-team specifications into detailed designs across technical subsystems, supporting a strong design-build-test environment.
• Work closely with SMEs to deliver engineering designs meeting functional specifications and established requirements.
• Produce fabrication-ready deliverables: fully dimensioned 3D CAD models, GD&T-compliant drawing packages, material and weld specifications, and assembly documentation.
• Chair design reviews. Own interface control documents, design basis decisions, and engineering change orders, kept consistent with CTO-issued freeze points.
• Maintain the Design Matrix and Systems Design Descriptions as live programme documents not as one-time deliverables.
• Manage Interface Control Documents between subsystems and at the boundary with Architecture-owned system definitions; raise constructability and manufacturing concerns early.

• Take Subcritical Systems’ existing high-level…