Sr. Systems Engineer

• An existing TS/SCI clearance

The Aerospace Corporation is the trusted partner to the nation’s space programs, solving the hardest problems and providing unmatched technical expertise. As the operator of a federally funded research and development center (FFRDC), we are broadly engaged across all aspects of space- delivering innovative solutions that span satellite, launch, ground, and cyber systems for defense, civil and commercial customers. When you join our team, you’ll be part of a special collection of problem solvers, thought leaders, and innovators.

Join us and take your place in space.

The Defense Systems Group (DSG) provides analysis-based decision support to senior leaders on space architectures, policy and strategy, technology development, warfighter capability enablers, systems integration, defense industrial base, and threat reduction to help shape existing and future space missions across the national security space (NSS) enterprise. DSG is unique at Aerospace as it not only directly supports major customers, including the U.S. Space Force, U.S. Space Command, Air Force Material Command, and senior leadership at the Pentagon, but also provides a broad range of technical support across the national space enterprise, maintaining vertical responsibilities with customers’ portfolios as well as horizontal, matrixed responsibilities across the corporation.

Additionally, DSG provides deep technical expertise to the Space Force Space Systems Command (SSC) in the conception, design, acquisition, launch and operations of satellite, launch vehicle, ground control, and range systems.

Aerospace is the trusted technical and programmatic advisor to the Evolved Strategic SATCOM (ESS) Program Office, responsible for system development, integration, and transition to operations on an aggressive national timeline. ESS is the recapitalization of the strategic satellite communications architecture that underwrites nuclear command, control, and communications, the system that has to work on its worst day.

This is your opportunity to sit at the center of it. ESS is an enterprise of space, ground, crypto, and terminal segments built by different contractors on different schedules, and someone has to own the seams between them. We are seeking a Sr. Systems Engineer who sees the whole system when everyone else sees their piece of it and the person the government turns to for the straight technical answer.

The exposure is unusual for this career stage. You will work alongside Aerospace subject matter experts, government customers, SETA, and development contractors, and you will support engagements with SPACECOM, STARCOM, STRATCOM, and the NC3 community. Most engineers wait a decade to see a program from this altitude. Your expertise will matter here, your ideas will shape national security, and your impact will be visible in both the acquisition strategy and the operational reality.

The selected candidate will be required to work full-time, on-site at our facility at Los Angeles Air Force Base, CA.

• Supporting system engineering and integration of the ESS enterprise across space, ground, crypto, and terminals, helping ensure nothing falls between the cracks
• Tracking and maintaining the critical interfaces between ESS segments and with external systems, including interface documentation, open-item tracking, and coordination of resolution
• Performing and supporting cross-segment technical analysis that feeds system-level trades, and helping frame the studies that retire integration risks before they become issues
• Supporting requirements development, decomposition, traceability, and verification planning across the enterprise baseline
• Preparing technical products, assessments, analyses,…