Advanced Reentry Technologies
Who We Are:
Inversion is an aerospace and defense company pioneering advanced reentry technology to enable next-generation capabilities from space. By combining high-performance materials, precision aerodynamics, and mission-driven autonomy, Inversion is transforming reentry into an operational capability for an entirely new class of missions.
The company’s highly maneuverable reentry spacecraft, Arc, is designed for rapid global cargo delivery, hypersonic testing, and other national security missions that require precise, controlled flight through the atmosphere. Arc creates an entirely new transportation domain, unlocking unprecedented speed and global reach.
Headquartered in Los Angeles, Inversion designs, manufactures, and integrates its spacecraft under one roof, enabling the company to move rapidly from concept to flight. The company is backed by leading investors including Y Combinator, Spark Capital, and Lockheed Martin Ventures, with customers across the U.S. government and commercial space industry.
Position Overview:
As a Hardware Test and Automation Engineer at Inversion, you will work as part of the simulation team to build, test, maintain, and develop the automated software and hardware systems that support the simulation and test environments for our flight systems. The simulation team is responsible for ensuring that flight software and flight hardware can be continuously integrated and tested under realistic flight conditions. You will play a key role in the automation of electrical ground support equipment (EGSE) and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) test benches that will enable fast, repeatable development and deployment workflows across the engineering stack. Your work will empower Inversion’s engineering teams to iterate rapidly throughout the development life cycle and will strengthen Inversion’s ability to put our products into the hands of our customers with unprecedented speed and agility.
- Automate provisioning, deployment, execution, operation, and logging tasks to optimize resource utilization and allocation
- Develop automated test scripts to support qualification efforts for our flight software and hardware systems
- Develop device API wrappers for EGSE equipment (e.g.: to control power supplies, oscilloscopes, etc., via automated test scripts)
- Develop emulators for flight hardware to support software-in-the-loop (SIL) and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing
- Integrate electronics hardware needed to enable on-demand, hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) simulation workflows (this includes building custom harnessing, performing safe to mate procedures, safely powering-up components, troubleshooting hardware interfaces, etc.)
- Contribute to the design and development of a simulation system capable of automatically provisioning and deploying resources to support simulation workflows
Required Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree in computer science, computer engineering, electrical engineering or equivalent technical experience
- Typically 1+ years of applicable hands-on experience of hardware experience
- Proficiency in one or more scripting languages (Python, Lua, Bash, PowerShell, etc.)
- Proficiency in one or more embedded languages (C/C++, Rust, etc.)
- Experience with Linux-based systems
- Experience handling and integrating unhoused/open-frame custom electronics and prototype hardware
- Must have the ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. government Secret/Top Secret security clearance
Desired Qualifications:
- Experience with data acquisition and logging
- Experience with robotics middleware and autonomy stacks (ROS 2, Webots, Orocos, YARP, etc.)
- Familiarity with modern DevOps practices
- Familiarity with time-series databases (InfluxDB, QuestDB, Prometheus, etc.)
- Familiarity with message-oriented middleware (NATS, Apache Kafka, RabbitMQ, etc.)
- Familiarity with containerization (Docker, Docker Compose, etc.)
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 $77,000 -$116,000. 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.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in computer science, computer engineering, electrical engineering, or equivalent technical experience
- At least 1 year of applicable hands-on hardware experience
- Proficiency in one or more scripting languages, such as Python, Lua, Bash, or PowerShell
- Proficiency in one or more embedded languages, such as C, C++, or Rust
- Experience with Linux-based systems
- Experience handling and integrating unhoused or open-frame custom electronics and prototype hardware
- Ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. government Secret or Top Secret security clearance
Inversion Space Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Inversion Space and has not been reviewed or approved by Inversion Space.
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Parental & Family Support — Public company profiles highlight generous parental leave, indicating a formal policy for new parents. Benefit listings specifically call out parental leave as part of the offering.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Unlimited PTO is described along with flexible hours, suggesting broad latitude to take time away when needed. Roles are largely on-site due to hardware work, but day-to-day scheduling flexibility is still referenced.
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Fair & Transparent Compensation — Job postings consistently disclose base-pay ranges for many roles, providing upfront visibility into expected compensation. Listings show banded ranges aligned to seniority levels, aiding calibration for candidates.
Inversion Space Insights
What We Do
Inversion is developing low-cost, high cadence re-entry vehicles. Returning cargo & resources will be essential for humanity to continue to grow within low-earth orbit and beyond. We believe in a future where returning from space is as common as launching to space. Join us: https://boards.greenhouse.io/inversionspace
