Materials and Process Engineer II (Aerospace)

Location: On-site in El Segundo, California, United States

Salary: $119,543–$172,673 per year, plus potential stock options and/or long-term cash awards.

Company

hirify.global develops commercial space infrastructure, including in-orbit pharmaceutical processing payloads, reentry capsules, thermal protection systems, and satellite buses. The company builds, integrates, and tests its vehicles, equipment, and materials in-house.

What you will do

• Develop, qualify, maintain, and control special processes for flight hardware, including ablative and thermal protection systems, coatings, polymers, composites, adhesives, and metallic structures.
• Develop wet chemical processes such as cleaning, etching, passivation, and conversion coating, while implementing corrosion prevention and chemical compatibility controls.
• Design experiments, methodologies, tooling, fixtures, and pathfinder hardware; characterize materials through mechanical, thermal, chemical, and microstructural testing.
• Use statistical methods to define robust process windows and establish requirements for cleanliness, contamination control, material handling, and test equipment.
• Create and maintain special process specifications, qualification and validation records, and control plans.
• Lead and support RCCAs, MRBs, failure review boards, and investigations of corrosion, contamination, defects, and material or process non-conformances with design, technician, quality, and laboratory partners.

Requirements

• B.S. in Materials Science, Mechanical, Chemical, Aerospace Engineering, or a similar field, or demonstrated equivalent experience and expertise.
• At least 1 year of materials, process, or manufacturing engineering experience in aerospace or another high-reliability industry.
• Expertise in metals, polymers, ceramics, composites, failure modes, corrosion mechanisms, basic chemistry, acid-base reactions, pH, and material compatibility with process chemicals.
• Hands-on experience with at least one relevant process or laboratory method, such as composite layup and cure, bonding, coating application, ablative or TPS fabrication, wet chemical processing, welding, machining, mechanical testing, or metallography.
• Expertise in descriptive statistics, distributions, confidence intervals, hypothesis testing, and regression.
• Experience reading engineering drawings, material specifications, and test reports, with first-principles problem solving for diagnosing process defects and driving corrective action.
• Experience working safely with acids, bases, solvents, PPE, and required chemical-handling procedures.
• Must be physically able to regularly lift 25 lbs., bend, stoop, and stand for extended periods while working directly with flight hardware.
• Because the role provides access to export-controlled items, candidates must be U.S. persons authorized to work in the United States.

Nice to have

• M.S. or PhD in Materials Science, Chemical Engineering, or a related discipline.
• Experience with ablative or high-temperature materials, polymer and composite processing, coatings and surface treatments, corrosion testing, wet chemical processing, aerospace metals, and related finishing processes.
• Experience with SPC, measurement system analysis, process capability, DOE, and statistical software such as JMP, Minitab, or Python.
• Experience with thermal, chemical, mechanical, and non-destructive evaluation methods, including interpretation of test results.
• Experience writing material and process specifications, test reports, and engineering memos, and supporting process qualification, first article builds, and RCCAs.
• Familiarity with space-environment materials and process requirements, including outgassing, contamination control, electrical bonding and grounding, and AWS, ASTM, AMS, or MMPDS standards.

Culture & Benefits

• Work directly on in-house development, integration, and testing of spacecraft, equipment, materials, and pharmaceutical processing payloads.
• Collaborate with design engineers, technicians, quality specialists, and partner laboratories.
• On-site work at the El Segundo production facility.
• Eligibility for incentives through stock options and/or long-term cash awards.
• Inclusive equal-opportunity workplace with evaluation based on merit, qualifications, and performance.