Senior Supplier Development Engineer I​/II – Mechanical

Long Beach, CA

Rocket Lab is the end-to-end space company building rockets, spacecraft, and critical subsystems that keep the world connected, protected, expand humanity’s reach to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. We move fast, build real hardware for meaningful missions, and make the impossible routine. Come shape the future with us.

Rocket Lab’s Supply Chain team is responsible for the flow of all materials, products, and components through the business. With many of our own products functioning as critical components to our own and our customers’ missions, the Supply Chain team has a direct impact on the success of our rocket and satellite programs. They set up the assembly kits that enables our technicians to put together our Electron rockets, manage inventory, look after shipping and receiving, manage direct and indirect procurement, and inspect and ensure that all of our materials and products are compliant and up to standard.

They are the chain that links our teams together, and are critical to our success.

Based out of Rocket Lab's headquarters in Long Beach, CA the Senior Supplier Development Engineer I/II – Mechanical is the primary technical owner of the supply base for a broad portfolio of mechanical hardware. This role is responsible for leading the end-to-end industrialization of suppliers from source selection and process qualification through NPI, PPAP, and production ramp thereby ensuring that every supplier can deliver conforming hardware at rate, on cost, and on schedule.

This is a hands-on, supplier-facing role requiring deep commodity knowledge across mechanical domains including but not limited to Complex Machined Parts, Electro-Mechanical Assemblies, Structural Composites, 3D printing and raw materials. The SDE operates proactively at the intersection of design, manufacturing, procurement, and quality. They are the ultimate internal advocate for supply chain manufacturability and capability.

• Lead end-to-end supplier industrialization for mechanical hardware from source selection and process qualification through NPI, PPAP, and rate production ramp.
• Partner with procurement and engineering to identify, evaluate, and select suppliers based on process capability, quality systems, and capacity across CNC machining, EDM, grinding, additive manufacturing, welding and electro-mechanical assemblies.
• Conduct supplier capability assessments during qualification phases, evaluating tooling maturity, measurement systems, process controls, and workforce qualification against program requirements.
• Lead Design for Manufacturability (DFM) reviews with design engineering at the earliest program stage, providing actionable feedback on feature complexity, datum schemes, tolerance stack-ups, and design characteristics that drive cost or quality risk.
• Own the APQP process at suppliers, driving completion of all quality planning deliverables — process flow, PFMEA, control plan, MSA/GR&R, and dimensional results — on schedule and to the required standard.
• Drive the PPAP program as a production readiness gate; define required submission levels, disposition supplier packages, and ensure process capability (Cpk) is demonstrated on critical and significant characteristics to enable at rate production.
• Lead First Article Inspection (FAI) activities at suppliers and in coordination with internal quality teams; ensure all findings are resolved to closure within project timelines.
• Identify systemic performance gaps; own supplier improvement plans and drive measurable progress against quality, cost, delivery, and capacity targets.
• Lead root cause and corrective action (RCCA) for supplier quality issues and escapes, applying structured problem-solving methods (8D, 5-Why) and validating that corrective actions are robust and sustained across all applicable parts and production lines.
• Apply lean manufacturing and statistical quality tools — including SPC, Cpk trending, and process audits — to drive continuous improvement across the mechanical supply base and eliminate sources of recurring defect.