Software Platform Engineer

Staff Software Platform Responsible Engineer

Long Beach, California

At Relativity Space, we’re building rockets to serve today’s needs and tomorrow’s breakthroughs. Our Terran R vehicle will deliver customer payloads to orbit, meeting the growing demand for launch capacity. Achieving commercial success with Terran R will unlock new opportunities to advance science, exploration, and innovation, pioneering progress that reaches beyond the known.

Joining Relativity means becoming part of a culture where autonomy, ownership, and impact exist at every level. This role is an opportunity to solve unprecedented problems, help build a rocket, factory, and business from the ground up, and see your work come to life in record time.

The Interplanetary Sciences Program was established to expand access to scientific exploration across our solar system. Its mission is to make planetary research faster, more affordable, and more capable than ever before by rethinking how science missions are designed, built, and operated. The program aims to enable scientists to send instruments to distant worlds without decades of development or prohibitive costs.

• Own the base operating system image and board support package across every Linux‑running processor in the payload— NAS controllers, compute nodes, payload controller— ensuring each boots a known, validated, reproducible image built through a rigorous Yocto‑based pipeline.
• Design and maintain board support packages for each hardware platform, including kernel configuration, custom kernel module integration, and device‑tree configuration for custom hardware.
• Build and validate the full boot sequence (U‑Boot or equivalent) and post‑power‑on‑reset automated recovery sequences, so the payload can recover from radiation upsets and return to a known‑good state without ground intervention.
• Develop system update and image deployment mechanisms, NFS server configuration for shared file system access across the payload, and system logging and health telemetry infrastructure that the rest of the software team depends on.
• Harden each image for the space environment— minimal attack surface, no unnecessary services, watchdog timer integration at the OS level, and file system integrity checks designed to survive years of radiation exposure.

• BS/MS in Computer Science or Electrical Engineering and 5+ years of relevant experience.
• Strong hands‑on experience with Yocto Project / Open Embedded build systems— built and maintained custom Linux distributions, not just consumed them.
• Demonstrated BSP development for custom hardware: kernel bring‑up, device‑tree debugging, driver framework integration, and getting a serial console to show a login prompt on a board never booted before.
• Solid C programming skills for kernel modules and low‑level system software, with comfort in cross‑compilation and toolchain management.
• Disciplined version control and reproducible build practices— understands why bit‑for‑bit reproducibility matters.

• Experience with embedded Linux for space, avionics, or other high‑reliability applications where the OS recovers gracefully from hardware upsets.
• Familiarity with radiation upset recovery at the OS level— automated reboot strategies, file system integrity validation, and graceful degradation.
• Experience with both ARM and x86 platform BSP development.
• Knowledge of real‑time Linux considerations () for time‑sensitive control tasks.
• Hardware lab comfort: serial consoles, JTAG debuggers, willingness to collaborate on device‑tree issues.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines for embedded image builds and automated hardware‑in‑the‑loop testing.

Hiring Range: $181,000 - $248,500 USD. Actual compensation will be determined based on experience, qualifications, and other job‑related factors. Relativity Space offers competitive salary and equity, a generous PTO and sick leave policy, parental leave, an annual learning and development stipend, and more.

We are an equal‑opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.