Staff RF Design Engineer

Blue Canyon Technologies, RTX's small satellite manufacturer and mission services provider, is solving some of the toughest challenges in space. Our components and bus platforms have completed missions ranging from very-low Earth orbits to lunar and interplanetary journeys at a fraction of the cost of traditional space systems. We support premier defense, commercial and civil organizations including the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, NASA, MIT Lincoln Lab, the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Colorado and more. Join our innovative and dynamic company as we build, test and operate the small spacecraft of the future.

Position Purpose: The Staff RF Design Engineer will design, build, and test space vehicle antennas for  BCT’s various bus solutions, and support RF analysis across all levels at BCT (Spacecraft, Radio, Antenna).

Title: Staff RF Design Engineer

Position Type: Full Time

Pay Range: $140,000 - $250,000

(Salary to be determined by the education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities of the applicant, internal equity, and alignment with market data.)

Location: Lafayette, CO

Benefits:

• 100% company paid health, dental and vision benefits for you and your dependents effective the first of the month following hire date
• Life insurance
• 401k (matching 4% with a minimum 5% contribution
• Generous PTO (3 weeks of vacation + 3 floating holidays, 2 weeks of sick time, 7 paid holidays throughout the year) and parental leave.

Job Responsibilities:

• Blue Canyon Technologies is looking for a Staff RF/Antenna Design Engineer to join our team. This Engineer will be working in a team environment, with frequent opportunities for customer engagement, new business development, concept design, detailed design, analysis, integration and test, plus orbit operations.
• Previous experience and skills in RF & Antenna design, research, development, RF front-end integration and testing.
• Provide design input related to RF test in early stages of program.
• Ability to conceive and develop configurable RF and antenna products across a diverse set of customer needs.
• Responsible for developing and integrating connectivity solutions for all of Antennas and RF products.
• Collaborate closely with other technical program leads and diverse domain expertise.
• This position requires excellent leadership skills, and strong technical expertise in the area of RF & Electromagnetic & Antenna.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, with attention to detail.
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to establish innovative, balanced technical and cost solutions.
• Work closely with customer to provide competitive solutions and support the BCT team in executing flight programs that meet technical and cost obligations for the customer.
• Ensure all business is conducted using the highest ethical standards and in compliance with all applicable laws, statutes, and regulations as well as company policies and directives.
• Ability to rapidly work with minimal supervision on projects involving both small and large engineering teams.
• Invent and drive technology roadmap for novel antenna and arrays solutions across wide range of Space craft design challenges.
• Mentor lower-level engineers as needed.
• Collaborate with legal teams, contracting, and management to work on proposals, submitting patents, research deployment budgets, track success metrics to achieve operational excellence.
• Other responsibilities as assigned.

Required Qualifications/Education:

• Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering is required. Master’s or PhD degree in RF/Electromagnetic/Antenna is strongly preferred. Substitute 2 years each for master’s and Ph.D.
• +15 years' experience with RF/Electromagnetic/Antenna design, research, development, integration and testing.
• This position requires excellent leadership skills, and strong technical expertise in the area of RF & Electromagnetic & Antenna.
• Experience with electromagnetic and circuit simulation tools such as (CST, HFSS, FEKO, Microwave Office, ADS, …)
• Lead RF/EM/Antenna design, implementation, validation, integration, fabrication, and testing from UHF to K-Band technologies.
• Comfortable in different lab environment and familiar with RF test equipment such as vector network analyzer, spectrum analyzers, and smith chart... etc.
• Experience with Antenna & Array & RF systems/circuits & front-end design.
• Experience with printed circuit board layout, assembly, preparing Gerber files… etc.
• Collaborate with EE/Mech/Thermal/Vibe/RF System/Tech/ESD teams to ensure RF antenna products pass all desired requirements.
• Multitasking and can operate on multiple projects to deliver high end RF antenna products to various customers and meet all deadlines.
• Develop high quality protoypes to be used for mass manufacturing.
• Develop novel flight antennas & RF solutions that meet all deep space requirements & RF-EM/ESD/charging/Thermal/Vibe/ Mech challenges.
• Develop antenna hat designs that can be immune to near-field noise to allow RF testing with minimal leakage and test risks.
• Define antenna specifications for BCT internal and external customer’s needs.
• Integrate Antennas with RF Circuit front to predict the RF system performance.
• Develop state-of-art 3D simulation model of the antenna on the Space Craft to improve overall RF system performance and predict coupling and radiated performance.
• RF Satellite Communication system design and Link budgets.
• Related technical experience may be considered in lieu of education.

Working Conditions:
This job operates in a professional office environment, but in a manufacturing company. This role uses standard office equipment such as computers, phones, photocopiers, scanners, filing cabinets and fax machines. BCT anticipates the application window closing approximately 40 days from the date the notice was posted.  However, factors such as candidate flow and business necessity may require BCT to shorten or extend the application window.

Physical Demands and Work Environment:

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit for long periods of time.  The employee is occasionally required to stand, bend, reach, and walk. The position requires some light physical effort. This would require the ability to lift or move objects up to 10 pounds and occasionally lift or move objects up to 25 pounds. Specific vision abilities are required by this job which includes close vision, distance vision, color vision, and ability to adjust focus.

Blue Canyon Technologies is a drug-free workplace and an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO)/Affirmative Action Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, marital

status, veteran status or any other protected factor. Blue Canyon Technologies is committed to providing access, equal opportunity and reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities in employment, its services, programs, and activities. To request a reasonable accommodation, contact Melissa Po at HR@bluecanyontech.com.