VP of Mission Engineering

About the company

Starfish Space is an in-space infrastructure company focused on affordable satellite servicing and missions such as its Otter program.

About this role

ABOUT STARFISH SPACE Starfish Space provides satellite servicing missions with its Otter servicing vehicle, including life extension missions for geostationary satellites and disposal missions for low Earth orbit satellites. Founded in 2019, Starfish has raised over $150M in venture capital funding and built a team of engineers with experience spanning satellite guidance, navigation, control, and autonomous robotics. Starfish has launched several missions to-date, and is focused on delivering Otter satellite servicing missions for SES, the U.S. Space Force, the Space Development Agency, NASA, and others. POSITION DESCRIPTION Starfish Space is building momentum for satellite servicing missions across commercial and government customers and is looking for a VP of Mission Engineering to help turn customer opportunities into successful missions. This role sits at the intersection of Business Development and Engineering, ensuring customer commitments are technically sound, executable, and aligned with Starfish's capabilities. This role will require a deep technical understanding of Starfish technologies, systems, and commercial strategies. You will work closely across teams to develop mission plans, evaluate technical feasibility, support development, and help guide opportunities from initial engagement through execution on orbit. The ideal candidate is comfortable operating in a fast-paced startup environment and can balance delivering value for customers with ensuring technical and schedule feasibility. RESPONSIBILITIES - Develop engineering work plans and execution strategies for commercial and government opportunities - Evaluate and make engineering and program decisions in collaboration with the Business Development and Engineering teams through the full lifecycle of a mission opportunity - Review and approve mission-related engineering analyses supporting customer commitments - Review critical customer-facing technical deliverables - Validate technical scope, schedule, and pricing prior to customer proposals and contract award - Discuss and coordinate engineering decisions directly with customers QUALIFICATIONS - U.S. citizen or permanent resident - Willing to work from Tukwila, Washington - B.S. degree or equivalent experience in a relevant field - Ability to thrive in a fast-paced startup environment - 10+ years of relevant experience PREFERRED EXPERIENCE - Understanding of systems engineering - Understanding of orbital dynamics - Understanding of hardware engineering - Experience planning and executing programs in the aerospace industry, ideally related to satellites - Experience working with commercial satellite operators or U.S. government space customers - Strong written and verbal communication skills - Excellent judgment and first-principles problem-solving skills 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., 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.