PCB Design Engineer, Avionics Hardware

Your Mission

As a PCB Design Engineer, Avionics Hardware at GITAI, you will own board-level electrical hardware design for spacecraft, robotic systems, and space defense programs, including interceptor-related systems.

This is a PCB design and avionics hardware role. It is not primarily an embedded software, firmware, or FPGA role. We are looking for someone who has personally designed real PCBs and taken them through fabrication, assembly, bring-up, and test.

What You’ll Drive

• Own PCB design for avionics hardware used in spacecraft, robotic systems, and space defense programs, from early architecture through schematic, layout, fabrication release, assembly, bring-up, and test.
• Design schematics and PCB layouts in Altium or similar ECAD tools, including stackup definition, layout constraints, design rules, fabrication notes, assembly drawings, and release packages.
• Make practical board-level design trade-offs across electrical performance, manufacturability, reliability, thermal behavior, packaging, component availability, testability, schedule, and cost.
• Work closely with mechanical engineers on board shape, mounting, connector placement, harness routing, enclosure constraints, thermal paths, vibration constraints, and assembly sequence.
• Work closely with firmware and software engineers on interfaces, board bring-up, telemetry, debugging, fault handling, test coverage, and hardware/software integration.
• Collaborate with systems, propulsion, and manufacturing teams to ensure avionics hardware works inside the full vehicle or robotic system, not only as a standalone board.
• Apply DFM, DFA, and DFT principles early in the design process and work directly with PCB fabrication and assembly vendors to resolve manufacturing issues before and during builds.
• Select components with attention to electrical performance, lifecycle risk, lead time, procurement constraints, package size, thermal behavior, derating, and test access.
• Bring up and debug PCBAs using lab equipment, test fixtures, firmware tools, and system-level test setups.
• Support integration, environmental testing, field testing, and failure investigations by identifying root causes and driving design changes quickly.
• Create and maintain clear engineering documentation, including schematics, layout files, BOMs, fabrication packages, assembly notes, test plans, issue logs, and design review materials.

What We’re Looking For

• Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, or a closely related hardware engineering field, or equivalent hands-on experience.
• 3+ years of hands-on PCB design experience using Altium or a similar ECAD tool.
• 1+ year of full-time experience at an early-stage hardware startup, ideally Seed to Series B, is required. Internship-only experience does not meet this requirement.
• Experience personally owning PCB designs from schematic capture through layout, fabrication release, assembly support, board bring-up, and test.
• Strong practical understanding of PCB fabrication and assembly, including stackups, layout constraints, fabrication notes, component placement, inspection, DFM/DFA/DFT, and vendor feedback.
• Ability to make and explain board-level design trade-offs across electrical performance, manufacturability, reliability, thermal behavior, packaging, component availability, testability, cost, and schedule.
• Experience working with mechanical, firmware, software, systems, and manufacturing teams to integrate electrical hardware into a real product or system.
• Hands-on experience debugging PCBAs using lab equipment such as oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, power supplies, electronic loads, multimeters, and test fixtures.
• Experience with mixed-signal, power, high-speed digital, sensor, communication, motor-control, or other board-level hardware systems.
• Ability to communicate clearly, document decisions, and work through ambiguous hardware problems with urgency and discipline.
• U.S. citizenship required, as this role will support U.S. government space and defense programs and may require eligibility to obtain and maintain a U.S. security clearance.