Lead Electrical Engineer, Hardware Reliability

About the role

This role focuses on ensuring the reliability of Starlink product hardware from manufacturing through field deployment. You will lead a team dedicated to minimizing hardware failures and customer downtime, working across the entire Starlink system from design to operation. This is a high-visibility position involving product launches and regular communication with senior leadership.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Lead and mentor a team of engineers and specialists focused on the reliability and field performance of Starlink User Terminal Kits, including user terminals, Wi-Fi routers, power supplies, and cables.
• Allocate team resources for new product qualification, production reliability, and field hardware investigations to ensure timely execution and rapid troubleshooting.
• Develop team members through technical mentorship, clear ownership, and growth opportunities aligned with Starlink program goals.
• Collaborate with hardware design, software, manufacturing, and supply chain teams to influence current and future designs for maximum reliability.
• Manage or lead technical investigations into performance or hardware issues affecting Starlink customers, whether from testing, production, or field findings.
• Develop and implement reliability qualification strategies for new and existing products to maximize field life and prepare for mass production.
• Design and conduct environmental, mechanical, electrical, RF, and system-level reliability testing for high-volume manufacturing changes.
• Automate reliability test execution, data analysis, and reporting for improved speed and decision-making.
• Define and monitor ongoing reliability testing and strategies to assess manufacturing health and identify long-term risks.
• Define and monitor critical hardware and performance field metrics, such as product return rates, to identify reliability shortcomings.
• Oversee production quality activities, including containments, material review board (MRB), defect processing, and quality metrics.
• Identify manufacturing inefficiencies impacting product reliability and drive process improvements.
• Maintain compliance with applicable quality system and ISO 9001 requirements.
• Lead root cause investigations for qualification, production, and field failures, driving corrective actions.
• Perform telemetry and log analysis and hands-on debugging to determine root cause for failed phased-array, Wi-Fi, and power supply PCBAs in the field.
• Understand Wi-Fi standards and Starlink network operation.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, materials engineering, manufacturing engineering, aerospace engineering, or another engineering discipline.
• 2+ years of experience executing complex engineering projects in design qualification, manufacturing, hardware reliability, reliability testing, or a production environment.
• 1+ years of experience in a leadership position managing a team of 3 or more engineers.

Nice to have

• Master's degree in electrical, mechanical, materials, manufacturing, or aerospace engineering.
• Experience developing and executing product qualification or hardware reliability strategies.
• Experience developing objective test, inspection, and acceptance criteria.
• Strong understanding of reliability engineering principles, failure mechanisms, root cause investigation, and risk-based decision-making.
• Experience developing environmental, mechanical, electrical, RF, or system-level test methods.
• Experience with PCB, PCBA, electromechanical assemblies, and complex hardware systems.
• Demonstrated ability to investigate complex hardware failures and implement corrective actions.
• Experience with high-volume manufacturing and transitioning hardware from development to mass production.

Skills & tools

• Data visualization
• Engineering tools

Practical notes

• To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, applicants must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.