Director of Embedded Software & FPGA Engineering

Job description

Wanna join the adventure? Loft Orbital is making space simple, giving commercial, defense, and government customers fast, reliable access to orbit through a standardized satellite platform. Our Hub and Cockpit products cut the complexity of traditional satellite missions, reducing time-to-orbit from years to months as we build a growing heterogeneous fleet in LEO with increasing onboard AI and compute.

As Director, Embedded Systems & FPGA Engineering, you will shape the technical foundations that determine how Loft’s hardware, embedded software, onboard software, and operational systems work together. This is an opportunity to define the abstraction layers and engineering interfaces that let teams move faster without sacrificing robustness, reliability, or system understanding. You will help create a platform that can evolve across processors, FPGAs, operating systems, hypervisors, RISC-V, Rust, and future technologies without forcing unnecessary changes through every layer of the stack.

You will lead experienced engineers who work at the intersection of hardware, firmware, software, systems, and operations. The role is hands‑on in the technical sense: you will not write production code every day, but you should be comfortable going deep into architecture, Linux and build environments, debugging, security boundaries, integration problems, and technical trade‑offs alongside the team.

About this role:

Own the ESW and FPGA roadmap and technical direction across Loft’s satellite platforms

Define HW‑abstraction architecture and interfaces across FPGA, embedded software, onboard software, and operational layers

Drive hardware‑agnostic and reusable platform capabilities where they improve team independence and allow HW and technology to evolve

Enable the ESW and FPGA leads through clear direction, decision context, coaching, and removal of organizational or technical blockers

Set expectations for architecture, design reviews, code quality, testing, verification, documentation, and operational readiness

Build the core engineering foundation for Linux, Yocto/OpenEmbedded, CI/CD, reproducible builds, and secure or sovereign environments

Guide technology choices involving hypervisors, RISC‑V, Rust, and other platform technologies when they create durable value

Act as the face of ESW and FPGA and the triage point for company‑wide technical issues, dependencies, and trade‑offs

Manage and develop geographically distributed leads and teams, including hiring, mentorship, performance management, and team health

Represent the organization with customers, partners, and government or defense stakeholders when formal assurance and documentation are required

Must Haves:

10+ years of experience in embedded systems, FPGA, firmware, or closely related engineering, including delivery of mission‑critical hardware or software

Proven experience leading and managing technical teams, including geographically distributed teams

Deep experience with FPGA design, embedded C/C++, real‑time systems, and HW/SW integration

Experience designing HW abstractions and hardware‑agnostic interfaces from both technical and architectural perspectives

Strong Linux kernel and embedded Linux experience, including low‑level integration, drivers, boot, or system debugging

Strong Yocto/OpenEmbedded and CI/CD experience, including build infrastructure, automated testing, and reproducible releases

Experience building secure and sovereign environments, including trust boundaries, secure boot, signing, controlled dependencies, or related security architecture

Experience with hypervisors, RISC‑V, ARM, and Rust development environments

Track record of making sound trade‑offs across reliability, performance, security, schedule, and technology evolution

Collaborative, solution‑minded leadership with the ability to enable leads, manage people with empathy and accountability, and act as a trusted cross‑company technical representative

Nice to Haves:

Experience with spacecraft avionics, command and data handling (C&DH), payload interfaces, or satellite flight systems

Experience in New Space or satellite manufacturing, particularly standardized, modular, or repeatable satellite platforms

Experience with radiation‑tolerant or radiation‑hardened design and an understanding of the space environment

Experience with real‑time operating systems such as RTEMS, FreeRTOS, or VxWorks

Experience with high‑speed interfaces such as Ethernet, SpaceWire, SpaceFibre, CAN, PCIe, USB, or MIL‑STD‑1553

Experience with ARM‑based embedded systems, U‑Boot, ARM Trusted Firmware, device‑tree overlays, or secure boot implementation

Experience contributing to upstream Linux or maintaining kernel modules, platform drivers, or low‑level middleware

Experience with hypervisor isolation, virtualized I/O, partitioning, or mixed‑criticality system design

Experience using RISC‑V or Rust in production, platform, tooling, or security‑sensitive environments

Exposure to onboard AI/ML compute or edge‑processing hardware

Experience supporting government or defense programs with formal assurance, security, sovereignty, and documentation requirements

Some of Our Awesome Benefits:

100% company‑paid medical, dental, and vision insurance option for employees and dependents

Flexible Spending (FSA) and Health Savings (HSA) Accounts offered with an employer contribution to the HSA

100% employer paid Life, AD&D, Short-Term, and Long-Term Disability insurance

Flexible Time Off policy for vacation and sick leave, and 12 paid holidays

401(k) plan and equity options

Daily catered lunches and snacks

International exposure to our team in France

Fully paid parental leave; 14 weeks for primary caregiver and 10 weeks for secondary caregiver

Carrot Fertility provides comprehensive, inclusive fertility healthcare and family‑forming benefits with financial support

Off‑sites and many social events and celebrations

Relocation assistance when applicable

Research shows that while men apply to jobs where they meet an average of 60% of the criteria, women and other underrepresented people tend to only apply when they meet 100% of the qualifications. At Loft, we value respectful debate and people who aren’t afraid to challenge assumptions. We strongly encourage you to apply, even if you don’t check all the boxes

Who We Are

Loft: Space Made Simple.

Founded in 2017, Loft provides governments, companies, and research institutions with a fast, reliable, and simple way to deploy missions in orbit. We integrate, launch, and operate spacecraft, offering end‑to‑end missions as a service across Earth observation, IoT connectivity, on‑orbit AI, national security missions, and more. Leveraging our existing space infrastructure and an extensive inventory of satellite buses, Loft is reducing years‑long integration and launch timelines to months. With more than 30 missions flown, Loft’s flight heritage and proven technologies enable customers to focus on their mission objectives.

With a growing fleet on track to reach 30 satellites by 2027, we are scaling up quickly across our offices in San Francisco, CA, Golden, CO, and Toulouse, France to meet accelerating demand for space infrastructure.

As an international company your resume will be reviewed by people across our offices so please attach a copy in English.

We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications, analyzing resumes, or assessing responses and identifying potential inconsistencies or verification signals in application materials based on available information. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans. If you would like more information about how your data is processed, please contact us.

State law requires us to tell you the base compensation range for this role, which is $195,000- $275,000 per year. This is determined by your education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities. The salary range for this role is intentionally wide as we evaluate individuals based on their unique experience and abilities to fit our needs. Most importantly, we are excited to meet you, and see if you are a great fit for our team. What we can’t quantify for you are the exciting challenges, supportive team, and amazing culture we enjoy.

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Worksite address

golden, CO, 80401, US

Who can apply

Review the original listing for work authorization, qualifications and employer requirements.