Engineer I, Orbit Program

Engineer I, Orbit Program 2025

Company Overview

Iridium is an award-winning and innovative satellite communications company with bragging rights to the only network that offers voice and data connectivity anywhere in the world. For over 20 years, Iridium's unique network and services have supported critical communications needs for individuals, businesses, and the evolving Internet of Things.

At Iridium, we understand the importance of staying connected and the limitations of traditional communications networks. People across the globe, including first responders, humanitarians, global militaries, scientific researchers, and lone workers, as well as ships, aircraft and remote operations all rely on Iridium to stay connected. We take our responsibility for providing these essential communications very seriously and pride ourselves on offering a reliable lifeline when needed. Likewise, Iridium is committed to providing an exciting and innovative workplace, where employees are challenged to think outside the box and collaborate on new, bold ideas and solutions. Our talented teams are passionate about their work and the impact our company makes around the world. Iridium fosters an empowering and inclusive culture that allows employees to genuinely be their best selves. We are looking for others who want to join this truly unique company that celebrates our employees and provides the opportunity to truly make a difference in the world.

Position Summary, Job Requirements & Responsibilities

What We're Looking For:

We are currently seeking engineers who are energetic, adventurous, and curious to learn and be a part of different aspects of Iridium's network, services, and products that support critical communications for millions of customers. The Iridium Orbit Program offers a unique, hands-on opportunity for those who want to experience a breadth of engineering and operations environments before embarking on a specific career path at Iridium. As a member of this 18-month program you will spend time with three different teams - spanning satellite operations, space engineering, product engineering, integration and test, gateway operations, space and ground software engineering, and product integration and certification. At the end of the program, you will be placed in the engineering discipline that aligns best with your skills and passions.

What You'll Do:

For 6 months at a time, you will be integrated into a few of the teams described below, learning the functions of the team while gaining diverse real-world experience. At the end of the 18-month journey, we'll match you with the team that best aligns with your educational background, skill set, and career interests-taking into account both your preferences and the needs of the teams. This is your chance to explore, learn, and discover the perfect fit for your future at Iridium!

Satellite Operations (Leesburg, VA)

This Satellite Operations team performs the real time operation, monitoring, and command and control of the Iridium satellite constellation and ground system, including execution of planned activities and recovering from anomalies, as well as performing orbit determination, mission planning and collision avoidance functions.

Space Engineering (Leesburg, VA)

The Iridium satellites are complex systems composed of subsystems such as Power, Attitude Control, Thermal, and Communications, to name a few. The Space Engineering team consists of subsystem experts who respond to satellite issues, as well as develop software features that improve performance, safety, and maintainability of the satellites.

Product Engineering (McLean, VA)

Iridium designs and develops the transceivers that enable users to connect to the Iridium satellite constellation. The Product Engineering team is responsible for the overall lifecycle of the Iridium transceivers from requirements, design, test, production, and sustainment. The team builds and maintains development, test and production systems, software tools, developer kits, and documentation.

Gateway Operations (Tempe, AZ)

The Gateway hosts the critical infrastructure which maintains all the Iridium services. The team monitors the health of Gateway systems and services in a 24x7x365 environment to respond to any anomalies. Additionally, they execute system and network preventative maintenance procedures, and implement system upgrades, updates, and configuration changes to minimize service disruption.

Integration and Test (Chandler, AZ)

The Iridium space and ground systems are constantly evolving. The Integration and Test team ensures all system changes are vetted before operational deployment, by testing software and/or hardware changes in a lab environment. The team interacts with high fidelity simulators as well hardware in the loop testing using satellite engineering models.

Space and Ground Software Engineering (Chandler, AZ)
Iridium designs and develops the satellite software for the Iridium satellite constellation and the software used on the ground to command and receive telemetry from the Satellites. The Space and Ground Engineering team is responsible for the overall lifecycle of the satellite and ground software from requirements, design, test, production, and sustainment. The team builds and maintains development and test environments, software tools, and documentation.

Product Integration & Certification (McLean, VA)

This team plays a key role in supporting partner product development for the Iridium Network. From onboarding new partners to guiding them through certification, they provide expert technical assistance and ensure their products meet our standards through design reviews and rigorous testing. The application engineering area of this team provides technical assistance via our Service Desk, where they address partners' questions and challenges during the product development phase. The team also delivers real-time customer service engineering support to service partners and retailers, participating in alpha and beta trials to test and enhance products and services

Experience & Education Requirements / EEO

What You'll Need to Succeed:

Bachelor's degree in any Engineering discipline, with a preference for Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, and Aerospace Engineering
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to communicate key messages and ideas clearly and effectively
• Can cultivate meaningful relationships with your manager and members of your team, while being open and responsive to constructive feedback as they guide and mentor you
• The ability to think outside the box to help solve problems, with the humility to ask for help when needed
• Adaptability to a dynamic environment and ready to take on any new tasks that may be handed to you
• A motivation to achieve outcomes and results
• Capable of handling multiple tasks at once and co.