Mission Dev Engineer - Internship (Summer 2027)

About the role

Nominal is building the connected test and operations platform powering the world’s most advanced hardware systems, from spacecraft and autonomous vehicles to next‑generation defense programs. Our platform gives hardware engineering teams a single place to ingest data, analyze performance, automate test execution, and collaborate across every phase of development, so they can move faster without sacrificing safety or precision. We serve top‑tier commercial and defense customers, including autonomy leaders like Anduril and Shield AI, aerospace teams like Hermeus and REGENT, performance engineering teams like Pratt Miller Motorsports, and mission partners within the U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force. Backed by Sequoia, General Catalyst, Founders Fund, Lux Capital, and Lightspeed, our team draws from SpaceX, Palantir, Anduril, Applied Intuition, and other leading companies.

The Mission Dev (forward deployed software engineering) internship is for Summer 2027, targeting students on track to graduate in Summer 2028 or sooner. Interns work directly with engineers building and testing complex hardware systems such as nuclear reactors, rockets, and supersonic aircraft, combining hands‑on software engineering with product judgment.

Responsibilities

• Work directly with customer engineers to understand their testing and analysis workflows and identify problems you can solve with software.
• Design and build integrations, data pipelines, and applications that connect Nominal to customers’ systems and handle high‑frequency, high‑volume hardware data.
• Own projects from problem definition through building, deploying, and supporting the solution, with mentorship from experienced engineers and domain experts.
• Put working software in users’ hands early, learn from how they use it, and iterate quickly based on feedback.
• Bring what you learn back to product and engineering teams, turning individual customer solutions into capabilities that benefit many.

Qualifications

• On track to graduate by Summer 2028 and open to a full‑time role afterward.
• Strong core engineering skills with hands‑on software development experience (internships, personal projects, or academic work).
• Desire to work directly with the people using your software and assess its impact.
• Comfort with open‑ended problems, learning unfamiliar systems, and delivering solutions.
• Personal passion for solving challenging problems and contributing to the future of critical infrastructure.
• Peers would describe you as ambitious, resourceful, and perseverant.
• Eligibility for ITAR: U.S. citizen or national, lawful permanent resident, refugee, asylee, or able to obtain required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.

Benefits

• Mentorship from a world‑class team.
• Trips to co‑locate with the team across our different offices.
• Free lunch, dinner, snacks, and drinks.
• A beginning‑of‑internship swag bag and an end‑of‑internship intern gift.
• In‑office hardware lab with a $250 project stipend.