Intern, Software Engineering, 2027

About the Role

Cowboy Space Corporation is seeking a talented Software Engineering Intern to join our team in San Carlos, CA. This is a quarter-long paid internship, offering an opportunity to work on cutting-edge space-based solar energy technology.

Responsibilities

• Design, development, and testing of software across flight, embedded, and ground systems, including avionics, guidance/navigation/control, and satellite bus/payload software
• Build and maintain software for signal processing, RF/optical communication pipelines, and on-orbit compute infrastructure (GPU/TPU clusters)
• Develop tooling and services for mission operations, telemetry/command infrastructure, and satellite health monitoring
• Write, test, and debug code across the stack — from low-level embedded/real-time systems to higher-level ground and data systems
• Collaborate with hardware, electrical, and systems engineering teams to define interfaces, debug integration issues, and validate end-to-end system behavior
• Build simulation, test, and hardware-in-the-loop frameworks to validate software against spacecraft requirements
• Participate in code reviews, write technical documentation, and contribute to engineering best practices as the team and codebase scale

Qualifications

• Currently enrolled as an undergraduate or graduate student in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related STEM field
• Strong fundamentals in software engineering: data structures, algorithms, and computer architecture
• Proficiency in at least one systems or general-purpose programming language (C, C++, Python, or similar)
• Collaborative, self-directed work style; comfort with ambiguity and learning quickly

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with embedded or real-time systems programming (RTOS, bare-metal, or similar constrained environments)
• Exposure to signal processing, hardware description languages (VHDL/Verilog), or FPGA-based development
• Familiarity with flight software frameworks (e.g., cFS, F Prime) or spacecraft software architectures
• Experience with version control, CI/CD pipelines, and automated testing frameworks
• Prior internship, coursework, or personal project experience involving robotics, satellites, avionics, or other hardware-adjacent software
• Comfort debugging across the hardware/software boundary, including use of tools like oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, or debuggers

Pay

$1,800 weekly

Benefits

• Daily lunch in the office
• Fully stocked kitchen with beverages and snacks

To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), applicants must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.