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Job Overview
Location
Los Angeles, Indiana, USA
Job Type
Full-time
Category
Software Engineering
Date Posted
December 2, 2025
Full Job Description
š Description
- ā¢ Architect, implement, and document embedded Linux systems composed of multiple daemons, services, and hardware interfaces designed for extreme reliability in remote and space environments. You will own the entire lifecycleāfrom initial board bring-up to long-term maintenance of systems that must run autonomously for years with minimal human intervention.
- ā¢ Own the BSP and driver stack across PCIe, SPI, I2C, UART, MIPI CSI-2, GPIO, and other hardware interfaces. You will write and maintain rock-solid drivers that interface with precision opto-mechanical hardware, ensuring that every photon collected by our telescopes is processed and transmitted without loss.
- ā¢ Bring up high-speed peripherals including PCIe endpoints, MIPI cameras, and multi-gigabit data links. You will validate signal integrity, tune PHY parameters, and guarantee deterministic throughput under thermal and radiation constraints typical of ground-based desert sites and on-orbit platforms.
- ā¢ Maintain build system health by keeping Yocto builds unblocked, reproducible, and hardened through strict CI/CD testing gates. You will craft BitBake recipes, manage layers, and integrate static-analysis and hardware-in-the-loop tests so that every firmware image is provably correct before it leaves the lab.
- ā¢ Design for resilience: create watchdog strategies, redundant boot chains, A/B partition schemes, and telemetry pipelines that allow remote diagnostics and over-the-air recovery. Your code will be the last line of defense when a telescope is operating 14,000 ft above sea level or orbiting 550 km over the poles.
- ā¢ Collaborate on automated testing by partnering with the test team to build lab infrastructure that enables frictionless writing and execution of hardware-in-the-loop tests. You will design test fixtures, define regression suites, and ensure that every hardware revision is validated against a comprehensive matrix of thermal, vibration, and power-margin scenarios.
- ā¢ Participate in product design reviews alongside electrical, mechanical, optical, and manufacturing engineers to ensure manufacturability, serviceability, and field reliability. Your early input will influence component selection, connector placement, and thermal budgets so that the final product can be serviced by a single technician wearing gloves at ā20 Ā°C.
- ā¢ Debug at the electrical-software boundary using oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, spectrum analyzers, multimeters, and power supplies. You will chase elusive timing issues, hunt down ground-loop noise, and occasionally discover that the problem is a two-millimeter solder bridge hiding under a BGA.
- ā¢ Contribute to a culture of continuous learning by documenting tribal knowledge, leading lunch-and-learn sessions, and mentoring junior engineers. Observable Space is still small enough that every line of code you ship will be reviewed by the CTOāand might one day be beamed to a satellite as a critical patch.
- ā¢ Champion long-term serviceability by designing modular firmware, versioned APIs, and field-upgradeable FPGA images. When a telescope in the Atacama Desert needs a new feature three years after deployment, your architecture will make the update as simple as pushing a signed container.
- ā¢ Embrace a bias toward quick iteration while never compromising on safety or reliability. You will balance rapid prototyping with rigorous validation, ensuring that the same codebase can evolve from a bench-top demo to a flight-qualified unit without a ground-up rewrite.
- ā¢ Infuse product sense into every decisionāchoosing conservative clock speeds over flashy benchmarks when the goal is twenty-year longevity, or lobbying for an extra millimeter of PCB trace width when it halves field failure rates. You understand that in space, āgood enoughā is never good enough.
šÆ Requirements
- ā¢ 2+ years in embedded software engineering or systems-level development
- ā¢ Strong proficiency in C and modern C++ with sound judgment about template usage
- ā¢ Solid understanding of DC power systems, motor drivers, and hardware interfaces (I2C, SPI, CAN, Ethernet, MIPI, PCIe)
- ā¢ Experience bringing up high-speed interfaces, especially PCIe and MIPI CSI-2 (D-PHY 1.4)
- ā¢ Ability to read schematics, debug at the electrical-software boundary, and use lab instrumentation (oscilloscope, logic analyzer, spectrum analyzer, multimeter)
šļø Benefits
- ā¢ Competitive compensation ($140,000ā$225,000 depending on experience) plus comprehensive benefits
- ā¢ Opportunity to work on cutting-edge hardware and software that operates on Earth and beyond
- ā¢ Collaborative, engineering-driven culture that values curiosity, precision, and continuous learning
- ā¢ Meaningful ownership over systems that directly shape the future of space operations
Skills & Technologies
GitHub
Linux
Remote
About Observable Space Inc.
Observable Space develops vertically integrated hardware and software solutions for real-time space observation. Formed through the merger of PlaneWave Instruments, a telescope manufacturer, and OurSky, a space data application platform, the company serves commercial, scientific, educational, and governmental sectors, alongside astronomy enthusiasts. Their offerings include software-defined telescopes and a developer platform for creating advanced space applications. With over 1,000 customers globally, Observable Space supports diverse missions, from spacecraft operations to scientific discovery, and connects with over 2,000 telescopes worldwide. This extensive reach and integrated approach make them a key player in advancing space observation capabilities.
