Mission Manager, Strategic Partnerships

ABOUT

Firefly Aerospace is a space and defense technology company that enables our world to launch, land, and operate in space – anywhere, anytime. As the partner of choice for critical space missions, Firefly is the only commercial company to launch a satellite to orbit with 24-hour notice and the only company to achieve a successful Moon landing. Our launch vehicles, lunar landers, and orbital vehicles provide government and commercial customers with full mission services from low Earth orbit to the Moon and beyond. Headquartered in north Austin, Texas, Firefly is looking for passionate, hardworking innovators to join our team and help fuel our successful trajectory into space.

SUMMARY

Firefly Aerospace is seeking an experienced Mission Manager to lead customer missions from early engagement and proposal development through payload integration, launch, and on-orbit operations. This role is customer-facing and strategically focused, combining deep technical understanding of payload integration with business development, proposal support, and long-term partnership building.

The Mission Manager serves as the single-threaded owner for assigned missions, acting as the primary interface between Firefly customers and internal teams across engineering, operations, legal, contracts, and business development. This individual converts customer needs into executable mission concepts while ensuring alignment with Firefly’s strategic growth objectives.

RESPONSIBILITIES

Mission & Customer Ownership

• Serve as the primary mission owner and customer interface for assigned government and commercial payload missions from contract execution through end-of-mission operations.
• Maintain full ownership of mission payload integration, launch vehicle interfaces, and mission execution strategy.
• Build trusted relationships with customers, acting as a technical and programmatic advocate throughout the mission lifecycle.

Strategic Partnerships & Business Development

• Support payload proposal development as a Subject Matter Expert (SME), with emphasis on payload integration, mission operations, and spacecraft interfaces.
• Partner with Business Development and Spacecraft Growth teams to source, shape, and support new mission opportunities.
• Participate in technical and commercial proposal writing, including mission concepts, CONOPS, schedules, and integration approaches.
• Collaborate with Legal and Contracts teams on SOWs, SSAs, and customer agreements to ensure mission success and clarity of scope.

Payload Integration & Mission Planning

• Oversee payload integration requirements and Interface Control Documents (ICDs) between customer payloads and Firefly spacecraft.
• Ensure alignment of mission performance, form/fit/function, environments, mass properties, mechanical and electrical interfaces, data interfaces, and operational concepts.
• Maintain ownership of the spacecraft–payload interface and drive resolution of technical and programmatic issues across teams.

Cross-Functional Leadership

• Lead technical interchange meetings, design reviews, and customer engagements.
• Coordinate across engineering, mission assurance, test, launch, and operations teams to execute mission plans.
• Identify and drive process improvement initiatives related to mission management, payload integration, and customer experience.
• Mentor and support junior mission managers or payload integration team members.

QUALIFICATIONS

Required

• Bachelor’s degree in aerospace engineering or related technical field.
• +7 years of relevant aerospace experience, including payload integration, spacecraft, launch vehicle, or mission execution.
• Experience executing at least one full mission lifecycle from contract execution through mission operations.
• Experience serving as the primary technical and programmatic interface with external customers.
• Demonstrated experience supporting business development activities, including customer engagement, mission concept development, proposal writing, or capture support.
• Ability to translate customer needs into executable mission architectures and commercial proposals.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to present technical and mission concepts to customers, partners, and internal leadership.
• Proven ability to operate with high autonomy, self-tasking based on high-level direction from leadership.

Desired

• Experience integrating payloads with spacecraft or launch vehicles.
• Experience supporting proposal development, capture efforts, or business development activities.
• Familiarity with aerospace qualification, acceptance testing, and mission assurance standards.
• Experience working with government customers (NASA, DoD) and/or commercial payload providers.
• Experience with risk management, change control, and cross-functional decision-making.

Firefly offers outstanding benefits for our employees, including generous health, dental and vision plans with low plan deductibles, parental leave, educational reimbursement, short term disability, pet Insurance, and flexible PTO options.

To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., 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.

Firefly Aerospace, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer; employment with Firefly is governed based on merit, competence and qualifications and will not be influenced in any manner by race, color, religion, gender, national origin/ethnicity, veteran status, disability status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, mental or physical disability or any other legally protected status.