Flight Sciences Tools and HPC engineer

Archer is an aerospace company in San Jose, California, building an all-electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft to advance sustainable air mobility.

About the role

Design, implement, and maintain internal software libraries and applications as well as computing infrastructure to enable engineers to solve problems faster and more efficiently. Promote shared computational infrastructure, tools, and practices across engineering teams within the Flight Sciences department. Develop processes and software tools to improve the reproducibility and traceability of computations. Drive the implementation of such tools and advocate for a culture of software excellence across the engineering organization.

Understand the needs of various engineering teams to efficiently utilize High-Performance Computing (HPC) resources, make informed decisions on infrastructure solutions, and ensure optimal resource utilization and cost savings. Maintain and administer on-premises HPC resources and advocate for engineering and computing needs with the company-wide IT department.

Requirements

• Master's or Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Computational Engineering, or a related field.
• 5+ years of experience as a user and developer of scientific/engineering software for flight sciences or similar disciplines (e.g., aerodynamics, acoustics, control, loads, thermal analysis, mass properties, vehicle simulation) in a fast-moving environment.
• Demonstrated experience in developing computing software and infrastructure, with proficiency in the scientific Python ecosystem (NumPy, SciPy, Pandas, Scikit-learn, TensorFlow/PyTorch, VTK).
• Demonstrated experience in standard best practices in software development, including version control, CI/CD, software testing, and environment management.
• Demonstrated experience with the design and administration of HPC systems, either on-premise or cloud (AWS preferred). Knowledge of Linux administration, high-speed network interconnects, parallel file systems, and MPI required.
• Experience with HPC management software (Slurm/PBS/Torque, OpenHPC/Bright, Warewulf/XCat, Spack/EasyBuild, Lmod).
• Good understanding of enterprise IT and common network security practices.
• Excellent problem-solving skills and ability to work collaboratively in a team environment.

Bonus qualifications

• Experience as an engineer in one or more areas of aircraft design: aerodynamics, conceptual design, rotor/propeller design, vehicle simulation, loads and dynamics, structural design, stress analysis, GNC.
• Contributions to open source scientific software projects.
• Experience with MATLAB and Simulink.
• Proficiency in one or more compiled languages (e.g., C/C++, Fortran, Rust).
• Familiarity with databases (SQL, NoSQL, time-series) and database application design (ORM/ODM).
• Experience with software packaging (Pip, Conda, Spack) and containerization technologies (Docker/Singularity/Shifter) for scientific software.
• Familiarity with software configuration management tools (Chef/Puppet/Ansible).
• Familiarity with common CI/CD tools and practices (TeamCity/Jenkins, Artifactory, Docker, etc.).
• Experience with analysis tools and workflows for aircraft/rotorcraft design (aerodynamics, CFD, GNC, loads, structural analysis, CAD, mass properties, etc.).

Pay

Target base pay range: $162,800 – $217,600. Actual compensation offered will be determined by job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.