Space Ground Systems Software Engineer
VardaIn-space Manufacturing company
El Segundo, United States$131,000 - $184,000 annuallyMid
Khosla Ventures
Founders Fund
Lux Capital
Caffeinated Capital
General Catalyst
Peter Thiel
Software Engineering
About the role
TL;DR
Develop and maintain critical ground segment software for spacecraft operations.
- •Varda is building commercial space infrastructure, including in-orbit pharmaceutical processing and reentry capsules.
- •The Mission Software team is responsible for critical ground segment software enabling spacecraft operations, working at the intersection of telemetry, commanding, data acquisition, and mission control.
- •Key Responsibilities Develop and maintain high-reliability services for telemetry ingestion, scaling, distribution, and commanding.
- •Deliver operator-grade UIs and dashboards for mission control.
- •Build tools for flight-software simulations, device emulators, and scenario-based automated tests.
- •Design, implement, and productionize software for mission and ground software teams, standardizing CI/CD, artifact management, and infrastructure-as-code.
- •Create robust deployment patterns for lab benches, test stands, and mission networks.
- •Requirements Bachelor's degree in computer science, math, physics, engineering or equivalent technical experience. 3+ years of experience in spacecraft or safety-critical software development.
- •Expertise in Python and strong understanding of language concepts.
- •Strong systems fundamentals: concurrency, networking, performance, reliability.
- •Experience building real-time data acquisition, scaling, and distribution services.
Required skills
PythonCI/CDKubernetesDockerLinuxGitC++
Nice-to-have skills
AnsibleREST APIgRPCWebSockets
Domain expertise
aerospacedeeptech
Benefits & perks
Stock options, Flexible PTO, 12 paid holidays, 100% company-paid Medical, Dental, and Vision insurance, FSA, HSA options, Voluntary accident, hospital, critical illness, and pet insurance, $120/month wellness reimbursement, 12 weeks of parental leave, Family building, pregnancy, parenting and menopause benefits via Maven Clinic, Sponsored One Medical memberships, 401(k) retirement plan with 6% employer match, $20/pay period cell phone reimbursement, Relocation support, Fully stocked kitchen, Lunch provided daily, Dinner provided twice weekly, Company and team-bonding events, Complimentary EV charging
Tech stack
PythonC++AnsibleDockerKubernetesCI/CDGitLinuxREST APIgRPCWebSockets