Senior Supplier Quality Engineer I

About the role

Rocket Lab is the end-to-end space company building rockets, spacecraft, and critical subsystems that keep the world connected, protected, and expand humanity’s reach to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. The company moves fast, builds real hardware for meaningful missions, and makes the impossible routine. The Supply Chain team is responsible for the flow of all materials, products, and components through the business. With many of Rocket Lab’s own products functioning as critical components to its own and customers’ missions, the Supply Chain team directly impacts the success of rocket and satellite programs. They set up assembly kits for Electron rockets, manage inventory, handle shipping and receiving, oversee direct and indirect procurement, and inspect materials to ensure compliance and quality standards. The Senior Supplier Quality Engineer I, based at Rocket Lab Optical Systems in Chantilly, VA, ensures quality requirements for procured parts, services, and processes are met. Acting as a liaison between internal customers and suppliers, the role translates technical requirements into clear supplier specifications, drives improvement, cost reduction, and process efficiency while managing conflicting priorities. Responsibilities include creating non‑conformance reports, performing supplier audits, managing supplier concessions, and identifying improvement opportunities to reduce risk