Senior Electrical Engineer - Power Electronics

Power the future of Space at Star Catcher

Star Catcher is building the first energy grid in space to power the orbital economy.

Today’s spacecraft must generate all of their own power, which caps what they can do and how long they can operate. But what if they could “plug” into a grid, the way buildings do on Earth? Instead of cables and outlets, Star Catcher is building the technology to wirelessly beam energy to spacecraft’s existing solar panels when and where they need it.
Be an early member of a team building an entirely new energy infrastructure at scale to power the next frontier.

Star Catcher Industries, Inc., located in Jacksonville, Florida
, has an opportunity for a Senior Electrical Engineer - Power Electronics
to support the development of space-to-space power beaming spacecraft and the Star Catcher Network, its orbital power grid.

• Lead and co-own power-domain architectures across projects with other senior engineering leads; lead power requirements generation and design reviews.
• Serve as subject matter expert for power electronics designs company wide.
• Lead investigation of novel power electronics concepts and technologies.
• Architect, design, and analyze high-power DC-DC converters, regulators, and power conditioning units capable of sustaining multi-kilowatt continuous loads.
• Design and analyze power distribution architectures and EMI filters, and analyze analog/power circuits for stability, efficiency, power draw, and in-rush behavior using SIMPLIS, SPICE, or equivalent simulation tools.
• Design robust interfaces between energy sources and high-power loads, addressing source impedance, inrush, transient demand, protection coordination, and operating limits.
• Design and analyze high-voltage subsystems and laser drive power, ensuring mitigation of corona discharge, arcing, and electrical breakdown in partial and deep vacuum environments.
• Write specifications and test approaches for power supply circuit designs, and select components or modules for discrete power converter and power conditioning designs.
• Create schematics for analog/power circuits and support PCB layout for power electronics hardware.
• Conduct and participate in peer design reviews, design verification testing (DVT) of engineering units, and provide oversight as designs move into production.
• Perform analog and power testing in a laboratory setting for development components and circuit cards.
• Work closely with digital/FPGA, RF, mechanical, and thermal engineering teams to ensure power electronics can survive the extreme thermal dissipation requirements of a continuous, multi-kilowatt load in a vacuum.
• Mentor junior and mid-level power electronics engineers, and manage technical relationships with external contractors and vendors.
• Lead power-switch selection and derating with the radiation-effects consultant, accounting for device-specific destructive single-event effects, application bias and transients, thermal limits, test-data gaps, and verification evidence.

• Education:
  
  Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or a related technical discipline.
• Experience:
  
  10+ years of professional experience in power electronics design, specifically with high-power, high-current regulators and power conditioning systems.

• Deep understanding of switching power supply topologies (e.g., buck, boost, forward, flyback, full-bridge, LLC).
• Demonstrated understanding of high-voltage design rules for space, including creepage and clearance, dielectric material selection, partial-vacuum breakdown behavior (including Paschen-region effects), and other vacuum-breakdown mechanisms relevant to space hardware.
• Proven experience in schematic capture and…