Electrical Test and Development Engineer

About the role

This is not a role for someone looking for a traditional 40-hour work week. Space Kinetic is building ambitious, first-of-its-kind technology, and that requires urgency, ownership, and a high level of commitment to changing the foundational assumptions for everything we do in space.

Responsibilities

• Support bring-up, testing, debugging, and validation of circuit cards, electronics assemblies, and functional electrical hardware developed by the electrical engineering team.
• Develop and execute electrical test plans, test procedures, and verification activities for boards, subsystems, and integrated hardware.
• Troubleshoot electrical hardware issues in laboratory and test environments using oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, multimeters, power supplies, electronic loads, and other standard test equipment.
• Support design validation, performance testing, failure analysis, root cause investigations, and corrective action activities.
• Work closely with design engineers to identify board-level issues, recommend design improvements, and support rapid hardware iterations.
• Assist with test fixture design, test equipment setup, data collection, and documentation of test results.
• Support integration of electronics hardware with sensors, actuators, embedded processors, communication interfaces, controllers, and software systems.
• Read and interpret schematics, PCB layouts, electrical drawings, interface control documents, test procedures, and bills of materials.
• Support environmental and qualification testing, including vibration, shock, thermal, thermal cycling, EMI/EMC, and system-level test campaigns.
• Support spacecraft electrical integration activities, including subsystem-level and system-level functional testing.
• Assist with wire harness development, including harness design support, fabrication, assembly, routing, labeling, continuity checks, and integration.
• Work with internal teams to support in-house development, creation, and build out of wire harnesses and related electrical assemblies.
• Support design for test, design for manufacturability, prototype builds, supplier coordination, and transition from development hardware to repeatable production.
• Drive hands-on testing and development in a fast-paced environment where hardware is designed, built, tested, and improved quickly.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or related engineering discipline.
• 3+ years of professional electrical engineering experience.
• Experience testing, debugging, and validating electrical hardware for spacecraft, satellites, aerospace, defense, or other high-reliability applications.
• Experience working on spacecraft hardware or spacecraft electrical systems.
• Experience with flight systems, flight electronics, avionics, or other mission-critical electrical hardware.
• Strong understanding of analog and digital circuit fundamentals.
• Experience reading and interpreting schematics, PCB layouts, electrical drawings, interface control documents, test procedures, and bills of materials.
• Hands-on experience troubleshooting electrical hardware using oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, multimeters, power supplies, electronic loads, and other standard lab equipment.
• Experience developing and executing electrical test procedures for boards, subsystems, or integrated hardware.
• Basic familiarity with schematic capture and PCB design tools, including Altium Designer.
• Experience supporting hardware bring-up, debugging, validation, and failure analysis.
• Ability to work closely with design engineers to identify issues, document findings, and drive problems to closure.
• Strong engineering fundamentals and ability to make sound technical judgments in hands-on test environments.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience testing or developing electronics for spacecraft, satellites, launch vehicles, missile systems, aircraft, defense systems, or other mission-critical hardware.
• Experience with flight-qualified or flight-intent hardware development.
• Experience supporting board-level bring-up for analog, digital, mixed-signal, power electronics, embedded systems, sensor interfaces, or motor control hardware.
• Experience with communication protocols such as CAN, Ethernet, RS-422, RS-485, SPI, I2C, and UART.
• Experience developing test fixtures, harnesses, breakout boards, automated test setups, or other lab infrastructure.
• Experience with wire harness design, fabrication, routing, connector selection, crimping, continuity testing, and integration.
• Experience with harness documentation, cable drawings, pinouts, interconnect diagrams, and interface control documents.
• Familiarity with board-level thermal considerations, electronics packaging, heat sinking, thermal interfaces, and thermal testing.
• Knowledge of EMI/EMC design practices and qualification testing.
• Experience with environmental testing including vibration, shock, thermal, and vacuum testing.
• Experience working with PCB fabricators, contract manufacturers, component suppliers, external test labs, or harness fabrication vendors.
• Familiarity with aerospace standards, high-reliability design practices, and configuration-controlled hardware development.
• Experience working in fast-paced development environments where hardware is rapidly designed, tested, and iterated.

What You’ll Bring

• Strong technical judgment and engineering fundamentals.
• A hands-on approach to electrical testing, debugging, and problem solving.
• A practical understanding of how electronics behave in real-world test, integration, and operating environments.
• Ability to work across electrical, mechanical, thermal, software, manufacturing, and systems engineering disciplines.
• Comfort supporting both detailed board-level testing and broader system-level electrical integration.
• A willingness to support adjacent hands-on electrical work, including wire harness development, assembly, and integration.
• Strong documentation habits and the ability to clearly communicate test results, issues, and recommended next steps.
• Comfort operating in an environment with ambitious schedules, evolving requirements, and challenging technical goals.
• A desire to help see hardware through the full lifecycle — from development and board bring-up to qualification, integration, and fielded operation.