Science Payload Responsible Engineer/Scientist

Relativity Space•Long Beach, CA 90801, US• Full Time

Posted 2 hours ago• Research

Compensation

$150,000–$207,000/year

Job Description

At Relativity Space, we’re building rockets to serve today’s needs and tomorrow’s breakthroughs. Our Terran R vehicle will deliver customer payloads to orbit, meeting the growing demand for launch capacity. But that’s just the start. Achieving commercial success with Terran R will unlock new opportunities to advance science, exploration, and innovation, pioneering progress that reaches beyond the known.

Joining Relativity means becoming part of something where autonomy, ownership, and impact exist at every level. Here, you're not just executing tasks; you're solving problems that haven’t been solved before, helping develop a rocket, a factory, and a business from the ground up. Whether you’re in propulsion, manufacturing, software, avionics, or a corporate function, you’ll collaborate across teams, shape decisions, and see your work come to life in record time. Relativity is a place where creativity and technical rigor go hand in hand, and your voice will help define the stories we’re writing together. Now is a unique moment in time where it’s early enough to leave your mark on the product, the process, and the culture, but far enough along that Terran R is tangible and picking up momentum. The most meaningful work of your career is waiting. Join us.

About the Team:

The Interplanetary Sciences Program was established to expand access to scientific exploration across our solar system. Its mission is to make planetary research faster, more affordable, and more capable than ever before by rethinking how science missions are designed, built, and operated. The program aims to enable scientists to send instruments to distant worlds without decades of development or prohibitive costs. By creating a sustainable model for interplanetary exploration, we are transforming space science from an occasional event into a continuous process of discovery that accelerates knowledge, broadens participation, and inspires the next generation of explorers.

About the Role:

We are seeking a driven science payload manager to lead the delivery, integration, and operations support for a science instrument suite. This is a highly technical role for a leader who combines deep technical and scientific competency, is confident in making risk-based decisions, and has a sense of personal ownership over the success of the instrument from build phase through on-orbit operations.

In this role you will serve as the responsible engineer for working with our partners to ensure the delivered instruments meet or exceed the desired science capability, and proceed smoothly and efficiently through environmental testing, spacecraft integration, commissioning, and in-space operations. This role requires you to understand the science and the engineering, manage risk proactively, make hard decisions under uncertainty, own the outcomes, communicate clearly to multiple stakeholders, and care deeply about the science results. You will need to understand the engineering systems and be an advocate for how they should be designed to support and enable collecting exceptional science on this and future missions. You will operate as part of a fast-moving, lean, multi-disciplinary team driven by mission success.

About You

Master's degree in planetary science, engineering, physics, or a related technical discipline
3+ years experience in science research
3+ years experience working on a spacecraft payload through multiple phases (e.g., some combination of formulation, build, testing, integration, on-spacecraft testing, commissioning, operations)
Relentless curiosity and a desire to understand and optimize systems
Familiarity with Earth and planetary science missions and the unique constraints on instruments (power, mass, thermal, data rate, radiation)
Excellent written and verbal communication skills

Nice to haves but not required

Experience with planetary science instruments

This position may require occasional travel to partner institutions, test facilities, and mission integration sites (<10% time). During critical mission phases including launch, commissioning, and early operations this position will require shift work and on-call availability.

Hiring Range and Leveling

Senior Engineer: 124,500 - 170,500
Staff Engineer: 150,000 - 207,000

Leveling and Compensation will be finalized after the interview process, based on an evaluation of job-related knowledge and skills, education, and experience.

At Relativity Space, we are committed to transparency and fairness in our compensation practices. Actual compensation will be determined based on experience, qualifications, and other job-related factors.

Compensation is only one part of our total rewards package. Relativity Space offers competitive salary and equity, a generous PTO and sick leave policy, parental leave, an annual learning and development stipend, and more! To see some of the benefits & perks we offer, please visit here.

Hiring Range:

$150,000—$207,000 USD

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

If you need a reasonable accommodation, please contact us at [email protected].