Xona Space Systems

Xona Space Systems

GNC Orbit Controls Engineer

Burlingame, California

No sponsorshipDetected 54 days ago
C++MATLABAlgorithmsCybersecurityAerospace EngineeringControls

About the role

  • Xona is the navigational intelligence company bringing real-time, centimeter-level certainty to any device, anywhere on Earth.
  • For Canada Roles: Successful candidates must obtain and hold a security clearance at the reliability status level, and pass security assessment for the Canadian Controlled Goods Program (CGP) and ITAR.
  • We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.

Responsibilities

  • Develop open-loop and closed-loop controllers for altitude management, station-keeping, and end-of-life disposal
  • Implement and maintain onboard orbit propagators, select and validate integrators, and ensure numerical consistency with ground truth
  • Build orbit determination pipelines using EKF with GNSS
  • Design burns and long-arc trajectories, and optimize delta V and timelines under comm visibility, power and thermal, and operations constraints
  • Maintain numerically consistent MATLAB and C++ simulators, create Monte Carlo campaigns, run SIL and HIL tests, and perform post-maneuver reconstruction
  • We're building the software that keeps our spacecraft exactly where they need to be.

Requirements

  • You are familiar with orbital mechanics and simulation and have had exposure with onboard propagators with perturbation models and integrators on flight targets
  • You have GNC software experience in C++ and MATLAB for analysis, modeling, and test-vector generation
  • You have supported real maneuvers and can reconcile plan versus truth with post-burn estimation
  • You are comfortable at the ADCS and propulsion interface for burn pointing and momentum management
  • Experience with orbit propagation algorithms
  • Familiarity with CCSDS ephemeris and attitude formats
  • For U.K. Roles: To comply with U.K. regulations, this role requires Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) checks, and successful candidates must be eligible to obtain UK Security Clearance (SC).
  • B.S. or M.S. in Aerospace Engineering, Control Systems, Applied Physics, or a related field
  • Familiar with electric propulsion including thrust modeling and calibration, long-burn guidance, duty-cycle planning, and thermal constraints
  • Trajectory design and optimization expertise

Company info

  • We're looking for a GNC Orbit Controls Engineer to design and implement the algorithms and onboard software that handle orbit determination, guidance, maneuver execution, and post-maneuver analysis to deliver safe, efficient, and highly automated station-keeping and disposal.

Visa & Work Authorization

  • citizen, lawful permanent resident of the United States (i

This listing is sourced directly from Xona Space Systems's careers page and normalized into a canonical job model.