Lead Hardware Reliability Engineer; Starlink Aviation

Space

X was founded under the belief that a future where humanity is out exploring the stars is fundamentally more exciting than one where we are not. Today Space

X is actively developing the technologies to make this possible, with the ultimate goal of enabling human life on Mars.

Starlink is the world's first and largest satellite constellation using a low Earth orbit to deliver broadband internet capable of supporting streaming, online gaming, video calls and more. Leveraging advanced satellites and user hardware coupled with our deep experience with both spacecraft and on-orbit operations, Starlink delivers high-speed, low-latency internet to users all over the world.

As the Lead Hardware Reliability Engineer on the Starlink Aviation team, you will have the opportunity to use your knowledge, experience, and creativity to manage a team of engineers and specialists focused on ensuring reliability and quality of the Starlink Aviation product through design, manufacturing, test, and flight. You will dive deep into the details to identify, understand, and solve difficult technical problems.

You will provide input to design and development of new and existing hardware and processes. Your work will be engaging and hands‑on, taking place in our brand‑new Woodinville office, on the shop floor, in the lab, and in the hangar to provide Starlink service to aircraft worldwide.

• Lead and mentor a small team of engineers, technicians, and specialists focused on end‑to‑end hardware reliability for Starlink Aviation (long‑term reliability testing during NPI, build reliability during production, flight reliability in the fleet)
• Develop the team by enabling opportunities suited to each member that align with the strategic goals of the Starlink Aviation program
• Investigate hardware failures and anomalies in test, production, and the fleet. Identify and mitigate the immediate and underlying failure root causes to reduce risk and improve reliability of designs and processes, ensuring major hardware concerns are escalated expeditiously and effectively and that appropriate resources are deployed using effective communication
• Responsible for ensuring long‑term product reliability of the designed hardware and ensuring that design requirements are adequately set to enable program goals and meet the reliability requirements of certification bodies
• Responsible for creating tools and metrics to understand hardware performance in the fleet and leveraging the data to drive reliability improvements for future designs
• Responsible for configuration management, change management, and risk management to enable highly reliable hardware
• Responsible for operations of Starlink Aviation returns and root‑causing of returned hardware, driving design improvements based on data and feedback
• Collaborate with multiple engineering disciplines, customers, and Starlink production to maximize reliability across all areas

• Bachelor’s degree in an engineering discipline
• 3+ years of experience in a reliability, manufacturing, quality, test, and/or design engineering role
• 1+ years of experience leading an engineering team

• Master’s degree in an engineering discipline
• 3+ years of experience leading engineering teams leading a team of 5+
• Demonstrated experience training and mentoring junior engineers
• Demonstrated experience working in a highly adaptive and iterative environment
• Ability to influence other organizations through strong engineering/business rationale and data
• Ability to effectively organize, assign, and track work/deliverables
• Ability to define scope of work independently and execute accordingly
• Ability to identify and analyze production process improvements for rate and quality
• Experience root‑causing PCB, PCBA and Electromechanical assemblies
• Working experience in an ISO
  9001/AS9100 or equivalent quality system
• Knowledge of quality tools such as Lean principles, measurement systems analysis, design of experiments, statistical process control, root cause analysis and corrective action, process failure mode and effects analysis (PFMEA),…