Structural Design Engineer - Space Plane

This is a fantastic opportunity to contribute to an exciting, fast-growing company in the aerospace industry and develop world-leading technology. As a structural engineer, you will be part of an elite team that designs and builds the industry’s next generation of suborbital and orbital reusable spaceplanes.

You will be a talented, creative thinker working as part of the New Zealand airframe structural and mechanical Space Plane design team.

You will be given ownership of projects from start-to-finish and will operate with a great deal of autonomy. We believe in giving you the tools you need, then getting out of your way. You must have the desire and ability to work in a young company – if you want a smooth and routine role; this role is not for you. You must be resilient and agile. But you will have the opportunity to demonstrate extreme ownership and be part of an instrumental team. Initially, this role will predominantly involve engineering, design and manufacturing.

Based in Christchurch, New Zealand, this role will require flexible hours in both mornings and evenings as you work with our Netherlands teams. It may also require international travel.

What you will do:

• Design and manufacturing of our reusable launch vehicle system.
• Develop vehicle parts and subsystems from high-level requirements.
• Design for manufacturing.
• Manufacture and assemble spaceplanes.
• Test and qualify flight hardware.
• Conduct compliance reporting.

What you bring:

• A degree (or post grad) in aerospace engineering, mechanical engineering or similar.
• 5+ years relevant work experience.
• Experience with the aircraft design process.
• Experience in designing for manufacturing.
• A demonstrated ability to flexibly and positively deal with evolving project constraints.
• An ability to complete a design process from requirement to final part assembly.
• Experience with computer-aided design, preferably SolidWorks.
• Experience in working with multidisciplinary teams.

It would be great if you are:

• Familiar with aircraft design standards.
• Experienced with lightweight engineering.
• Experienced in metal and composites fabrication.
• Experienced with FEA.
• Experienced in manufacturing and production.
• Experienced with MATLAB, Python or similar.
• Used to working with a geographically wide-spread team.
• An analytical thinker
• Experience with 3D printing, SLS, SLA, and FDM.

About Dawn Aerospace

Dawn Aerospace was founded to redefine near-space transportation. Redefine how we deliver assets to space, position satellites on orbit, and return things down to Earth to enable the vibrant and circular space economy of the future. To do this, we build scalable, accessible, and sustainable spaceflight technologies – technologies that are sustainable for not just the foreseeable future, but the unforeseeable future.

The company has achieved a series of significant milestones in the past 12 months, including launching 27 propulsion units to space from Europe, the USA, and Russia, and completing the successful first flights of the suborbital spaceplane, the Dawn Mk-II Aurora. Dawn was named Hi-Tech Startup Company of the Year (2020) and won the Supreme Award for medium/large business at the Westpac Champion Business Awards 2021.

Current customers include the likes of D-Orbit, the Indonesian Space Agency, and a large number of yet-to-name constellations. Dawn’s satellite propulsion business is forecast to more than double during 2022. Based on current units in space and in production, we're fast on track to become the number one supplier of green-chemical propulsion systems globally.

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. Employment with Dawn is decided based on merit, competence and qualifications and will not be influenced in any other manner.

Dawn Aerospace is an Accredited Employer with Immigration New Zealand.

Important! If you think you have what it takes but are unsure that you check every box, we still want to hear from you.