Founding Lead GNC Engineer
Pillar Space · Los Angeles, CA · hybrid
USD 185,000 to 275,000 per year
FOUNDING LEAD GNC ENGINEER
Equity: 0.3% – 1% depending on experience
ABOUT US
We're a stealth team building space hardware at the edge of what's currently possible — high-stakes, flight-grade systems where the engineering bar is unforgiving and the upside is enormous. While we can't share full details yet, our founding and early engineering team includes talent from SpaceX, Northrop Grumman, and Impulse Space, the group includes people who've pulled off feats almost no one else on Earth has.
ROLE OVERVIEW
We are seeking a Lead Founding GNC Engineer to own guidance, navigation, and control from first principles for autonomous spacecraft, across rendezvous, proximity operations, and related autonomous flight operations.
This is a senior technical leadership role. You will not only define and execute the GNC architecture, but also help build the engineering team, set technical standards, mentor engineers, and establish the systems, processes, and culture required to develop flight-grade autonomous spacecraft.
This is not a narrow algorithm role. You will help define the full GNC system: trajectories, sensors, actuators, flight software, testbeds, simulations, hardware-in-the-loop infrastructure, fault handling, and flight operations. You will make system-level trades across software, hardware, sensors, autonomy, avionics, propulsion, and mission design.
The ideal candidate has direct experience with spacecraft GNC, autonomous rendezvous and proximity operations, trajectory design, sensor fusion, hardware testing, and technical team leadership. We recognize that very few people have all of this. What matters most is that you have exceptional fundamentals, have led real systems from concept toward flight, have managed or mentored engineers in high-performance technical environments, and can operate independently in ambiguity while making sound engineering tradeoffs. You will have direct ownership over one of the company's core technical challenges.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Own the GNC architecture for autonomous rendezvous, proximity operations, and related mission phases, from early design through simulation, testing, integration, and flight.
- Lead the development of guidance, navigation, and control algorithms for approach, stationkeeping, proximity maneuvers, aborts, collision avoidance, and other safety-critical maneuvers.
- Design and analyze trajectories for orbital operations and other relevant flight regimes, including mission trades, dispersions, constraints, and operational margins.
- Provide technical leadership across GNC, autonomy, simulation, test, and flight software efforts.
- Help hire, manage, mentor, and develop GNC, controls, autonomy, simulation, and related engineers as the team grows.
- Establish engineering processes, review standards, technical decision-making norms, and verification discipline appropriate for flight-grade systems.
- Build relative navigation and state-estimation systems using sensors such as vision, LiDAR, radar, IMUs, GNSS, star trackers, and other flight-relevant hardware.
- Develop high-fidelity simulation, Monte Carlo, hardware-in-the-loop, and processor-in-the-loop test environments to validate GNC performance and robustness.
- Help define requirements, interfaces, error budgets, verification plans, and fault-handling approaches for the GNC subsystem and broader vehicle.
- Select, integrate, and test GNC-relevant hardware, including sensors, actuators, processors, and representative test equipment, working with vendors and internal teams as needed.
- Develop and test flight GNC software in close collaboration with flight software, avionics, autonomy, propulsion, mechanical, and mission operations teams.
- Contribute to system-level trades across algorithms, sensors, hardware, software, schedule, cost, reliability, and mission risk.
- Work closely with the founders and early engineering team to shape the technical roadmap, engineering culture, hiring plan, and long-term GNC strategy.
- Represent the GNC function in cross-disciplinary design reviews, customer conversations, investor diligence, vendor discussions, and mission planning as needed.
BASIC QUALIFICATIONS
- Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, Controls, Computer Science, or a related technical discipline.
- 8+ years of experience designing, simulating, implementing, testing, or flight-qualifying GNC algorithms for spacecraft, launch vehicles, hypersonic/reentry systems, autonomous aircraft, robotics, or other high-reliability autonomous systems.
- Prior experience leading technical workstreams, managing engineers, mentoring junior and mid-level engineers, or building high-performing engineering teams.
- Demonstrated ability to own complex technical systems from early architecture through implementation, test, validation, and operational readiness.
- Strong fundamentals in orbital mechanics, control theory, estimation, dynamics, linear algebra, numerical methods, and sensor fusion.
- Experience with GNC simulation, including 6-DOF dynamics, closed-loop simulation, Monte Carlo analysis, dispersions, and off-nominal testing.
- Proficiency in MATLAB/Simulink and at least one production language such as C, C++, Python, or Rust.
- Experience taking algorithms beyond analysis and into real implementation, hardware testing, flight software, embedded systems, hardware-in-the-loop, processor-in-the-loop, or representative testbeds.
- Ability to work independently with limited direction, identify the right next problem to solve, and drive technical work from ambiguity to tested hardware or software.
- Ability to make practical system-level tradeoffs across performance, schedule, cost, reliability, testability, and mission risk.
- Ability to lead through influence in a cross-functional environment spanning flight software, avionics, autonomy, propulsion, mechanical, systems, and mission operations.
HIGHLY VALUABLE EXPERIENCE
We do not expect every candidate to have all of the following. The strongest candidates will likely have depth in some areas and the ability to quickly learn the others.
- Direct experience with spacecraft rendezvous, proximity operations, or autonomous capture.
- Experience leading GNC, autonomy, controls, simulation, flight software, or mission design teams.
- Experience managing engineers in a startup, aerospace company, defense contractor, launch company, robotics company, or other high-reliability technical environment.
- Experience setting technical direction, conducting design reviews, making architecture decisions, and holding teams accountable to execution milestones.
- Experience with advanced flight regimes such as atmospheric reentry, entry/descent guidance, hypersonic flight, aerodynamics, or aerothermal constraints.
- Experience defining trajectories for proximity operations, inspection, servicing, stationkeeping, or other constrained autonomous spaceflight operations.
- Experience with optical navigation, LiDAR navigation, radar navigation, or multi-sensor relative navigation against cooperative or non-cooperative targets.
- Experience integrating radar into an autonomy or GNC sensing chain, including measurement modeling, tracking, calibration, filtering, and failure modes.
- Experience with AI for GNC, AI-assisted autonomy, learned perception, learned dynamics models, reinforcement learning for control, AI-based sensor processing, onboard autonomy, or AI-enabled fault detection.
- Experience selecting, purchasing, integrating, and testing GNC hardware, including sensors, actuators, processors, cameras, LiDAR, radar, IMUs, GNSS, star trackers, reaction wheels, or propulsion components.
- Experience working with vendors, evaluating datasheets, performing make-buy decisions, navigating supply chain issues, and qualifying hardware for flight or other high-reliabilit