The Role
The Senior Firmware Engineer will develop firmware for spacecraft systems, debug hardware, implement communication protocols, and collaborate with various engineering teams. They will ensure system performance, reliability, and integration in VLEO satellite missions.
Summary Generated by Built In
Be one of the Bedo 100
Albedo is making Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO) mainstream, building the infrastructure to usher every satellite mission set into this new orbital domain. We build buses, integrated satellites, and turnkey missions for customers to thrive in VLEO, between 250 km - 400 km, where proximity compounds performance and drag self-cleans debris.
As part of the first 100 employees at Albedo, you will have a big impact on Albedo’s trajectory to proliferating VLEO — whether you’re advancing hardware to increase satellite longevity, scaling production for large constellations, building next-gen flight and ground software to push performance, or enabling missions that matter for national security and our day-to-day life here on earth.
How We Operate: Albedo takes a first-principles approach — in space and in business. We move with speed, take calculated risks, and learn quickly. We use AI regularly to create leverage in every discipline across the company. We work in-person at our Broomfield CO HQ to maximize team and company productivity. We work hard and with urgency to compound our first-mover advantage.
Who We're Looking For: Builders who want to own outcomes, not tasks. Systems thinkers who balance precision with iteration while thinking about the big picture. Individuals who are energized by creating a category rather than competing in an existing one. You’ll join a team that has already proven what others said wasn’t feasible and is now scaling and upgrading our VLEO buses & payloads to serve mission sets across sensing, communications, and responsive operations.
If you can feel the excitement running through your veins, apply to be one of the Bedo 100.
What You’ll Do:
- Develop bare-metal firmware in C/C++ for MCU-based avionics systems.
- Own MCU boot flows, startup behavior, interrupt handlers, and register-level peripheral drivers.
- Bring up new hardware and debug board-level issues using schematics, datasheets, scopes, multimeters, logic analyzers, and debuggers.
- Implement and validate communication protocols including UART, SPI, I²C, CAN, USB, Ethernet, and related interfaces.
- Work directly with FPGA/gateware engineers to read memory maps, build drivers, and debug cross-boundary issues.
- Partner with flight software and controls teams to define deterministic FW↔FSW interfaces for real-time systems.
- Build test hooks, automation, and documentation that make firmware easier to validate and integrate.
- Support spacecraft integration and test campaigns.
- 5–10 years of firmware engineering experience in embedded or real-time systems.
- Bachelor’s degree or higher in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field.
- Strong C and C++ skills for memory-constrained and performance-sensitive systems.
- Bare-metal firmware experience on microcontrollers.
- Experience with registers, boot flows, interrupts, peripheral drivers, and low-level debugging.
- Experience with mainstream MCU families.
- Comfortable reading schematics and reasoning about signal paths, power rails, timing, and interface behavior.
- Hands-on bench experience with oscilloscopes, multimeters, logic analyzers, and debug probes.
- Experience working with FPGA/gateware teams or register-level memory maps.
- Experience defining and debugging HW↔SW or FW↔FSW interfaces.
- Motor control and field-oriented control for brushless or CMG-class motors.
- Real-time control-loop firmware and FW↔FSW protocol design.
- New-hardware bring-up and board-level debug for avionics or high-reliability systems.
- Rust.
- Python for test automation.
- RTOS exposure.
- Experience using AI tools in daily engineering work, including LLM assistants for code, review, debugging, documentation, and design. Albedo uses Claude Code extensively.
- $130,372 - $160,038 per year
Compensation and Benefits for Full-Time Roles:
- Employee friendly equity compensation
- 4% direct matching 401k
- Health Insurance: 100% employee coverage & 75% dependent coverage
- Parental leave and childcare coverage
- Flexible vacation and sick time from day one
- 12 company holidays
- $100 monthly wellness benefit
- Relocation package if not based in Denver
The final compensation package is subject to change if the candidate's experience and company need drive a different job level than originally slated for the position.
Albedo does not accept agency resumes. Please do not forward resumes to Albedo employees. Albedo is not responsible for any fees or overhead related to unsolicited resumes.
Additional Requirements: In compliance with federal law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United States and to complete the required employment eligibility verification form upon hire. All persons hired will be required to be a U.S. citizen, a lawful permanent resident of the U.S., or 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.
Equal Opportunity Employer/Veterans/Disabled: Albedo is an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
Relocation: Relocation support for this position is available
US CITIZENSHIP IS REQUIRED
#LI-Onsite
Skills Required
- 5-10 years of firmware engineering experience in embedded or real-time systems
- Bachelor's degree or higher in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field
- Strong C and C++ skills for memory-constrained and performance-sensitive systems
- Bare-metal firmware experience on microcontrollers
- Experience with registers, boot flows, interrupts, peripheral drivers, and low-level debugging
- Experience with mainstream MCU families
- Comfortable reading schematics and reasoning about signal paths, power rails, timing, and interface behavior
- Hands-on bench experience with oscilloscopes, multimeters, logic analyzers, and debug probes
- Experience working with FPGA/gateware teams or register-level memory maps
- Experience defining and debugging HW↔SW or FW↔FSW interfaces
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The Company
What We Do
Albedo is the first space company to commercialize and provide platform capabilities to the new orbit regime of VLEO. VLEO — very low Earth orbit — transforms satellite capabilities by operating twice as close to Earth, enabling dramatic improvements in performance while reducing system costs. Albedo’s first satellite Clarity-1 — launched in March 2025 and now operating in VLEO — exemplifies the disruptive potential of the company’s proprietary VLEO platform. Clarity-1 delivers imagery at a resolution previously exclusive to drones & aircraft or billion-dollar classified satellites, while showcasing a platform that can support a variety of mission types. The world is rapidly changing and a new level of visibility and transparency is required to solve some of our largest problems. Albedo’s 10cm visible and 2m thermal imagery will fuel insights for industries such as mapping, insurance, utilities, solar, agriculture, carbon offsets, infrastructure sustainability, national security, and much more.
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