Principal Hardware Reliability Engineer

The role

You will own the development and execution of reliability strategies for spacecraft and constellations. You will define requirements, build modeling techniques, and drive testing programs to mitigate risks. This role integrates reliability models with program risk management and leads root cause investigations.

What you will do

• Own development and maintenance of top-level reliability requirements, models, and allocations.
• Define and drive HALT/HASS strategies, accelerated testing plans, and reliability growth programs.
• Establish and evolve reliability modelling frameworks including Weibull, Kaplan-Meier, and Monte Carlo simulations.
• Integrate reliability analyses with program risk management.
• Flow down reliability requirements to subsystems.
• Lead root cause investigations on critical hardware failures.
• Collaborate with design, systems, test, and manufacturing teams.
• Mentor and develop junior and mid-level engineers.
• Serve as a technical authority on reliability across multiple spacecraft programs.
• Own FRACAS and test-effectiveness tracking.

Required qualifications

• S. degree in mechanical engineering, aerospace engineering, electrical engineering, materials science, or other related discipline
• 8+ years of experience in reliability engineering, hardware testing, failure analysis, or related fields in the space, automotive, semiconductor, or other high-reliability industries

Nice to have

• S. or PhD in mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, materials science, or other related discipline
• Experience developing and executing life testing methods, including accelerated life testing (ALT) and reliability growth programs
• Experience with accelerated failure time (AFT) modeling, including Norris-Landzberg and Arrhenius acceleration models
• Experience reconciling multiple ground test sources and flight telemetry onto a single reliability model
• Familiarity with success-run and zero-failure demonstration statistics, and sample-size/DOE methods
• Exposure to degradation-based reliability modeling
• Experience with thermal, vibration, and TVAC qualification and acceptance testing approaches
• Experience with EEE components in high-reliability or space applications
• Experience building reliability prediction models and performing system-level analyses
• Experience with Bayesian hierarchical modeling and MCMC tools is a plus

Benefits

• Paid time off
• Medical/dental/vision coverage
• Life insurance
• Paid parental leave
• Many other perks

Before you apply

• Must be a U.S. person as defined by 22 C.F.R. § 120.15 or otherwise eligible for a federally issued export control license

About the company

K2 is building the largest and highest-power satellites ever flown for missions from LEO to deep space. The company is mass-producing high-power satellite platforms and is a high-growth Series D-funded company.