Electrical Engineer

Company Overview

Second Order Effects started in 2016 as a services firm, taking on other companies’ hardest engineering problems from first principles. We grew into a solutions firm that designs and ships complete custom electronics and systems, including power electronics, RF, and control systems. We’ve completed over 250 projects for more than 100 clients. Our designs control rocket engines, manage satellite communications, instrument fusion reactors, and are enjoyed by consumers around the world.

We approach problems from first principles. We break challenges down to their most fundamental components, which is how we find solutions that hold up across industries, use cases, and engineering functions. We focus on solving the right problems and building the teams to take them on. Because we believe that training and empowering others yields a greater impact than focusing on developing any specific technology, we expect every single member of our team to participate in building up those around them.

In the past year, we’ve started taking our own concepts and spinning them out into separate companies that we believe will meet the emerging needs of our clients and the industry  work is concentrating in frontier technology, including space, fusion and fission energy, and advanced vehicles. We currently have two spinout companies in stealth that we’re working on.

As an Electrical Engineer, you will support the design, architecture, and implementation of high performance electrical systems across a diverse range of projects. You will work alongside a collaborative team of engineers to find and develop the right solutions for the problems at hand and client use case. If you’re passionate about tackling mission-critical challenges and working across multiple industries, this is your chance to make a lasting impact and grow in a dynamic environment.

• Drive design efforts for electronic systems, including architecture and implementation details of circuitry and software/firmware
• Perform component selection and trade studies of different implementation options to best generate and satisfy design requirements
• Capture schematics and design PCB layouts, create component symbols and footprints
• Circuit simulation and thermal analysis of designs, including sizing of thermal management systems
• Develop firmware in C/C++ for microcontrollers, or digital design in Verilog HDL for FPGAs
• Write and execute test plans for device validation and performance characterization
• Take ownership of the design, development, testing, and end-to-end technical support for projects
• Assess design risks and develop mitigation strategies
• Create documentation for hardware, software and systems
• Interface with internal teams and external clients to conduct design reviews for hardware/electronic systems and code reviews for software/firmware/HDL

• Able to work 40 hours a week on-site in El Segundo, California, or Redmond, Washington
• Eligible to work on ITAR projects
• Bachelor's Degree (Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, Physics, Math, or related field) or equivalent experience
• 3+ years of applied experience with a demonstrated passion for engineering and technology development
• Excellent written and verbal technical communication skills; ability to explain technical concepts and their implications to non-technical audiences
• Experience in any common ECAD tool, such as Altium Designer, KiCad, Cadence, PADS, EAGLE, etc.
• Experience with C/C++ firmware development or Verilog HDL development
• Experience in modeling, simulation, and testing of electronics
• Familiarity with standard digital communication methods including serial / UART, SPI, and I2C
• Expertise with one or more of the following: analog circuits, mixed-signal designs, embedded programming, RF, power electronics, or optical systems development

• Experience in team-based design and build projects (e.g., Formula SAE, Solar Car, Cube Sat, Rover Challenge, etc.)
• End-to-end electronics design experience: taking designs from requirements generation through schematic, layout, fabrication, and hardware bringup
• Experience with analog…