Spacecraft System Architect Lead

At Stoke, we believe a thriving space economy will enable a vibrant, sustainable, and equitable future here on Earth. That is why we’re building Nova, our fully and rapidly reusable launch vehicle. Designed for daily flight, Nova tackles the core challenges of space transportation by reducing cost, increasing availability, and improving reliability. By radically lowering launch costs and increasing flight cadence, we’re helping create a truly scalable space industry. Our team is mission-driven, collaborative, and empowered to take ownership of their work. If you want to work alongside some of the most dedicated and talented people on Earth, we’d love to have you join us. This is a new organization within Stoke, with a goal to develop products on a 3–10 year horizon that grow Stoke beyond launch. Nova moves mass to orbit. This group takes on what comes next: spacecraft and on-orbit mobility that move mass to any orbit, downmass that returns it to Earth, and the satellites, platforms and factories that put mass to work once it is there. The organization is small by design, and everyone here carries a second hat. Description As Spacecraft System Architect Lead you are one of the founding technical members of this new team. You will take customer input and business goals and turn them into a conceptual system architecture, a concept of operations, system requirements and a product breakdown, then carry that architecture through detailed design, build, test, flight and on-orbit operations. You will make the early cross-disciplinary trades (propulsion, GNC, power, thermal, structures, avionics, software, ground) with limited information and own the consequences, on vehicles that must work for years, not hours. You will decide what we build, what we buy and what we partner for, and you will help grow the team around the product. You will learn from integrated test and flight and feed it back into the next architecture. You must be ready to stay focused, move fast, self-direct, and learn on the fly. Key responsibilities • Translate customer and business objectives into system concepts, ConOps, functional capabilities and system requirements for the group's products. • Develop the product breakdown and perform first-order analysis across every discipline to size the system and estimate mass, power, cost and performance with incomplete information. • Make the early cross-disciplinary trades (propulsion, GNC, power, thermal, structures, avionics, software, ground) with limited information, and carry them through architecture and design reviews. • Establish design margins, reliability targets and an incremental development path from first demonstration to production. • Define interfaces to Nova and to customer systems; select and manage external partners for major subsystems, owning requirements, interface control and acceptance. • Support the full product lifecycle: detailed design, integration, test, launch and on-orbit operations; feed lessons learned back into the next architecture. • Be the technical face of the product with customers and partners alongside Stoke's business development team. • Act as program lead for schedule, budget and risk through first flight, and help grow the engineering team as the product matures. Minimum qualifications • Bachelor's degree in aerospace, mechanical, electrical engineering, physics or a related field. • 10+ years of spacecraft or launch vehicle engineering experience, including at least one spacecraft carried from concept through on-orbit operations. • Experience as a chief engineer, system architect, vehicle lead or equivalent accountable technical role on a spacecraft or stage. • Exceptional command of fundamentals in one or more of structures, propulsion, thermal, power, GNC, avionics or software, and the ability to apply first-order analysis across all of them. • Demonstrated ability to make rapid, well-reasoned architectural decisions across disciplines with incomplete information. • Excellent written and verbal communication skills. • Ability to lead and to follow. Preferred qualifications • Flight heritage on a long-duration spacecraft (GEO, MEO, cislunar or multi-year LEO) where thermal, power, radiation and propellant management over the mission life drove the design. • Experience with atmospheric reentry, aerobraking or other atmospheric flight phases of a space vehicle. • Exposure to high-delta-v maneuvering, rendezvous and proximity operations, or refueling. • Shipped flight hardware on a startup timeline, at a company or within a team where you made the architectural trades yourself rather than inherited them. • Production-rate or constellation bus experience (cost per unit, factory mindset) in addition to bespoke performance. • Experience with national-security space customers and the demonstration-to-program path. • Experience with storable or green chemical propulsion, electric propulsion, or refueling interfaces. • Experience leading or managing engineering teams. • Master's degree or PhD in aerospace engineering or a related field. Benefits • Equity – We know that our employees are the reason we succeed. To give everyone a stake in our future, we are pleased to offer equity in the form of stock options to all regular, full-time employees. • Comprehensive benefits program including subsidized medical, dental, and vision insurance • Company-paid life and disability insurance • 401(k) plan with employer match • 4 weeks’ Paid Time Off • Holidays – 10 days (including an end-of-year closure) • Paid Family/Parental Leave • On-site gym or monthly wellness stipend (depending on location) • Dog friendly offices! Compensation Target Levels: • Level 4 Range: $151,305 - $252,105 • Level 5 Range: $176,505 - $327,810 • Level 6 Range: $262,185 - $393,435 Our job posts are intentionally written to attract a wide variety of experience levels, and we make decisions about the right fit on a per-candidate basis. Your actual level and base salary will be decided based on your specific experience and skill level. ITAR Requirements To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S. (i.e., current Green Card holder), or protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3). Equal Opportunity The Company is an Equal Opportunity Employer, including with respect to disability and veteran status. It is committed to compliance with all equal opportunity laws, including the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) and Title VII. It does not discriminate on the basis of nationality, race, citizenship, immigration status, or any other protected class when it comes to employment practices, including hiring. Employment at the Company is contingent upon satisfactory completion of reference and background checks, and on your ability to prove your identity and authorization to work in the U.S. for the Company. Employees must comply with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services employment verification requirements, and, therefore, they must complete an Employment Eligibility Verification Form I-9 at the start of employment and re-verify authorization to work periodically. Separate from this I-9 process, as noted above, this position entails access to certain technology and technical data that is restricted under U.S. export control laws and regulations. Employment or continued employment may be conditioned on your legal authorization to work with or have access to export control materials as necessary to perform your job. Candidate Rights & Accommodations If you require a reasonable accommodation to complete the application or participate in the interview process, please contact careers@stokespace.com. Requests will be handled in accordance with applicable laws. Please do not include medical or other confidential information in your initial request. For more information about your rights, please refer to the "Know Your Rights" notice here. E-Verify Stoke Space uses E-Verify to confirm the identity and employment eligibility of all new hires. For more information on the right to work, please refer to the poster here.