Director of Business Development (Hypersonic Flight Experiments)

Eras of humanity can often be defined by a dominant transportation mode - horse drawn chariots, ocean going boats, or aircraft. These were spurred by a small group of people rigorously focused on building technology to achieve faster access to more of the world.  We seek to usher in a new era of humanity defined by universal access to the whole globe free of borders and the presence of a routine way from space to Earth. To do this, we are building highly maneuverable re-entry vehicles that can loiter in orbit before precision landing back on Earth. 

Position Overview: 
As the nation advances its hypersonic capabilities, there is an increasing need for hypersonic flight testing to facilitate the development of these technologies. The Director of Business Development is an exciting new position at Inversion focused on providing high value, recoverable, and affordable hypersonic flight test to address this increasing demand. This role is highly outbound-focused, combining cold outreach, trade show engagement, and early-stage customer development. You will be on the front lines, introducing our hypersonic technologies to government, defense, and commercial aerospace stakeholders. 

Key Responsibilities: 

This position will focus on identifying, qualifying, pursuing, and capturing hypersonic flight experiments in support of the USG and industry partner needs.  You will work closely with the leadership team across BD, Engineering, Missions, and Contracts to provide best value and executable flight tests to buying customers. Responsibilities include: 

• Proactively identify and engage new customers via phone, email, LinkedIn, and in-person outreach 
• Represent the company at aerospace and defense trade shows, conferences, and industry events 
• Qualify inbound and outbound leads and convert them into active sales opportunities 
• Conduct introductory calls and meetings to understand customer needs and align them with our hypersonic capabilities 
• Build and maintain a pipeline of qualified opportunities in CRM 
• Coordinate with engineering and leadership to support technical discussions and proposals 
• Track market activity, competitor positioning, and customer feedback 
• Support early capture activities for government and defense programs (as applicable)  

Required Qualifications: 

• Total 10+ years in one or more of the following 
• Overall technical sales leadership for hypersonic capabilities 
• Procuring flight tests for hypersonic flight experiments 
• Directly managing hypersonic flight experiments 
• Prior experience in a technical sales role for commercial or government for hypersonic capabilities. 
• Comfortable with high-volume outbound calling and follow-up 
• Experience engaging technical and executive stakeholders 
• Strong communication skills with the ability to translate complex technical concepts into customer value 
• Willingness to travel for trade shows and customer meetings 
• U.S. work authorization (and ability to obtain a security clearance if required) 

Desired Qualifications: 

• Strong understanding of the various types of internal and external hypersonic flight experiments 
• Strong understanding of the various current options for hypersonic flight tests 
• Knowledge of various test options for hypersonic systems, subsystems, and components, including via wind tunnel testing 
• Experience working with government customers, commercial customers, and stakeholders for hypersonic flight experiments 
• Active DoD security clearance.  

Our office headquarters is located in Playa Vista, CA. This position requires in office presence.

The California annual base salary for this role is currently $220,000 - $290,000.  Pay Grades are determined by role, level, location, and alignment with market data.  Individual pay will be determined on a case-by-case basis and may vary based on the following considerations: interviews and an assessment of several factors that are unique to each candidate, job-related skills, relevant education and experience, certifications, abilities of the candidate and internal equity.