Northrop Grumman Mission Systems sector delivers a decisive advantage to its customers through software-defined, hardware-enabled solutions. Northrop Grumman Mission Systems (NGMS) in Linthicum enables these hardware solutions by providing RF microwave and mixed signal architecture, design, verification, and support expertise across a wide variety electronic sensor products. Our engineers work on complex, leading edge, high reliability electronics supporting maritime, ground, airborne, and space platforms.
NGMS engineers share a great sense of pride knowing their contributions have a direct effect on the safety and security of the country and its allies. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity, teamwork, and bringing your whole self to work to accomplish the mission while learning and having fun along the way. The Mission Sector Engineering and Sciences (MS E&S) organization is fertile ground for all experience levels to become part of our growing team and contribute to our goals. The department offers opportunities to grow on a technical track both broad and deep as well as explore project leadership or management positions.
MS E&S is seeking engineers with experience and interest in electronic assembly and packaging design including:
- Designing, modeling, and verifying RF and mixed signal assembly product types including apertures, radome, circulators/isolators, Transmit/Receive modules and switches, interposer assemblies, filters, RF manifolds/splitters, backplanes, beamformers, and other relevant RF building blocks within RF antenna subsystem.
- Designing, modeling, and verifying RF and mixed signal subsystems products including Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) and other RF Subsystem products within an electronic sensor system like a Radar.
- Using industry design tools for modeling and simulating RF and mixed signal performance. Tools include but are not limited to: ANSYS EM Suite, CST Microwave, Keysight ADS, Genesys, Matlab/Simulink, Xpedition, DXDesigner, TICRA/GRASP, FEKO, Python/C++/C#, Github, Labview.
- RF and mixed signal hardware test planning and test specification creation
- RF and mixed signal hardware production follow, engineering troubleshoot and sustainment engineering.
- Prototyping RF and mixed signal hardware with standard RF test equipment such as RF lab equipment such as vector network analyzers, spectrum analyzers, digital oscilloscopes, signal generators, phase noise test sets, and power meters.
- Antenna measurements using anechoic chambers and antenna range test equipment.
- Deriving and trading requirements from antenna subsystem-level down through component levels.
- Managing RF budgets, frequency planning, and common assembly level interfaces.
- Predicting assembly level performance through selecting materials, components, and packaging approaches, RF chain analysis, electromagnetic simulation, data collection and analysis, and other modeling techniques
- Collaborating with peer functions such as Mechanical, Manufacturing, Quality, Supply Chain, and Test Design.
- Utilizing world class manufacturing capabilities both on-site and within the broader company for prototyping through full-rate production from the foundry level to microelectronic packaging to printed circuit board fabrication and assembly to subsystem level integration and test
- Working directly with a wide variety of different external supplier partners including leading domestic foundries, printed circuit board fabricators and assemblers, component manufacturers, material fabricators, and more
- Supporting products throughout the product life cycle
These roles are contingent upon Program Award.
This requisition can be filled at either the T03 or T4 level based on the below requirements.
T03 Principal Engineer Basic Qualifications:
- Electrical Engineering or related STEM field degree: Bachelor of Science with 5 years of RF/microwave experience; Master’s degree with 3 years of RF/microwave experience; or PhD degree
- US Citizenship is required
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD Security Clearance
- Proven knowledge of electrical engineering design software and equipment
- Effective verbal and written communication skills
- Productive in a team working environment
T04 Senior Principal Engineer Basic Qualifications:
- Electrical Engineering or related STEM field degree: Bachelor of Science with 9 years of RF/microwave experience; Master’s degree with 7 years of RF/microwave experience; PhD degree with 4 years of experience
- US Citizenship is required
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD Security Clearance
- Proven knowledge of electrical engineering design software and equipment
- Effective verbal and written communication skills
- Ability to design, implement, install and maintain electrical systems
- Technical Team Leadership
Preferred Qualifications:
- Secret or Top Secret / SCI security clearance
- Direct experience designing or testing AESA / phased array, Radar, SIGINT, or SATCOM products
- Experience working in DoD Radar electronic designs through all phases of a product’s lifecycle from concept through production support
- Integrated Circuit packaging techniques including chip-and-wire, QFN, flip-chip, interposers
- Electronic troubleshooting from component to assembly levels
- Graduate degree concentration in RF/Microwave Engineering or Computional Electromagnetics
- Demonstrated ability to write code to conduct complex data reduction and analysis using Matlab or Python/C++/C#
- Technical team leadership experience with or without Cost Account Management Experience
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or related STEM with 5 years of RF/microwave experience; OR Master's with 3 years; OR PhD
- For Senior Principal: Bachelor's with 9 years RF/microwave experience; OR Master's with 7 years; OR PhD with 4 years
- US Citizenship is required
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD Security Clearance (Interim Secret required for start)
- Proven knowledge of electrical engineering design software and equipment
- Effective verbal and written communication skills
- Productive in a team working environment
- Ability to design, implement, install and maintain electrical systems
- Technical team leadership
- Secret or Top Secret/SCI security clearance
- Direct experience designing or testing AESA/phased array, Radar, SIGINT, or SATCOM products
- Experience with DoD radar electronic designs through all phases from concept through production support
- Integrated circuit packaging techniques (chip-and-wire, QFN, flip-chip, interposers)
- Electronic troubleshooting from component to assembly levels
- Graduate degree concentration in RF/Microwave Engineering or Computational Electromagnetics
- Demonstrated ability to write code for complex data reduction and analysis (Matlab, Python, C++, C#)
- Experience with industry EM/RF tools and RF test equipment (ANSYS EM Suite, CST, Keysight ADS, Genesys, TICRA/GRASP, FEKO, Xpedition, DXDesigner, VNA, spectrum analyzers, signal generators, anechoic chamber measurements)
- Technical team leadership experience with or without Cost Account Management experience
Northrop Grumman Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Northrop Grumman and has not been reviewed or approved by Northrop Grumman.
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Retirement Support — 401(k) matching is considered strong, with additional defined-benefit coverage for certain cohorts and options like catch-up contributions. Retirement programs are repeatedly highlighted as a core strength of the total rewards.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — PTO, company-paid holidays, and compressed work schedules (such as 9/80) provide meaningful time away and flexibility. These scheduling options are cited as a major quality-of-life benefit across many locations.
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Parental & Family Support — Paid parental leave alongside caregiver leave, adoption assistance, and back-up care supports a range of family needs. These programs have been expanded recently, signaling continued investment in family support.
Northrop Grumman Insights
What We Do
We are a close-knit community of big thinkers collaborating to keep the world safe. Our passion, creativity and expertise bring next-level technology solutions to life in autonomous systems, cyber, C4ISR, strike, space, and logistics and modernization for our customers around the globe. On the Northrop Grumman team, you’ll join our pursuit of excellence immersed in a dynamic culture of innovation and respect. Your unique perspective will help achieve our shared vision for the future of global security. Every step of the way, you'll be supported by world-class training, employee resource groups and a comprehensive benefits package that enables greater health and happiness for you and your family. Worldwide and across disciplines, we’re challenging what’s possible for technology to protect people and places from undersea to outer space and into cyberspace. And we see the impact of our performance every day. We are Northrop Grumman, and we work on what matters—now, you too can make a difference. Explore opportunities in engineering, IT, manufacturing, business management, cybersecurity and more with us. Northrop Grumman is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.








