Space Systems Engineer

The Mission Optimization team is responsible for continuously improving the operations and productivity of the world’s largest Earth observation satellite constellation. We identify, triage, and resolve the bottlenecks that limit what our fleets can deliver - from contact scheduling and downlink latency, to collection capacity, to concepts of operation for our future missions.

As a Senior Space Systems Engineer on this team you will own the definition of novel concepts of operations. You will take problems that begin as a customer commitment, a contractual obligation, or an unexploited spacecraft capability, and turn them into an operational concept that engineering teams can build and operators can run.

You will operate with substantial latitude, working closely with spacecraft and systems engineering groups to understand what current and future fleets are capable of, with the software and operations teams who build and run the systems you’re changing, and with Product and customer-facing teams to stay anchored to commitments and SLA risk. Being effective across those boundaries is a core part of this job.

This is a full-time, hybrid role which will require you to work from our Berlin office 3 days per week.

Impact You’ll Own:

• Define and own concepts of operations for new missions, new spacecraft capabilities, and new customer products, from early design through nominal operations
• Lead optimization initiatives that span multiple organizations - setting the technical direction, building agreement, and holding the outcome against fleet SLAs and KPIs
• Serve as a primary technical interface for the team with stakeholders across engineering, operations, and product
• Translate contractual and customer obligations into operational concepts and capacity commitments the fleet can actually meet
• Model and analyze fleet performance with operational data to identify where capacity, latency, or agility are being left on the table
• Design, develop, and maintain the software solutions that implement these concepts
• Act as a recognized subject-matter expert across Planet and provide technical mentorship within the team

• 10+ years of relevant experience in spacecraft operations, mission systems engineering, or a closely related field
• Bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Engineering, Systems Engineering, Computer Science, or a related technical field
• Ownership of concepts of operations for complex operational systems, from definition to implementation
• Working proficiency in Python or a comparable language, ability to model systems, analyze operational data, and contribute production code
• Quantitative approach, including statistical analysis and reasoning over large operational datasets
• A track record of leading technical initiatives across organizational boundaries
• Ability to communicate and negotiate technical positions with senior stakeholders
• Experience mentoring or technically leading other engineers

What Makes You Stand Out:

• Experience operating or designing operations for a large-scale satellite constellation
• Background in optimization, scheduling, or operations research
• Experience taking a new mission from design through commissioning and nominal operations
• Familiarity with commercial Earth Observation, tasking, or fulfillment systems
• Experience in a customer- or partner-facing technical role
• Familiarity with orbital mechanics, link budgets, and spacecraft resource modeling
• Experience with DevOps tooling and practices (Git, GitLab, Docker, CI/CD, Linux, Sentry, Datadog)

These offerings are dependent on employment type and geographical location, based upon applicable law or company policy.

• Paid time off including vacation, holidays and company-wide days off
• Employee Wellness Program
• Home Office Reimbursement
• Monthly Phone and Internet Reimbursement
• Tuition Reimbursement and access to LinkedIn Learning
• Equity
• Volunteering Paid Time Off, The expected starting gross salary range for this role is listed below. Individual placement within this range is determined objectively based on gender-neutral criteria such as your skills, qualifications, and professional experience. This position may also be eligible for discretionary bonuses and/or equity. Germany Salary Range €86.600-€108.300 EUR

San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Welcome to Planet. We believe in using space to help life on Earth.

Planet designs, builds, and operates the largest constellation of imaging satellites in history. This constellation delivers an unprecedented dataset of empirical information via a revolutionary cloud-based platform to authoritative figures in commercial, environmental, and humanitarian sectors. We are both a space company and data company all rolled into one.

Customers and users across the globe use Planet’s data to develop new technologies, drive revenue, power research, and solve our world’s toughest obstacles.

As we control every component of hardware design, manufacturing, data processing, and software engineering, our office is a truly inspiring mix of experts from a variety of domains.

We have a people-centric approach toward culture and community and we strive to iterate in a way that puts our team members first and prepares our company for growth. Join Planet and be a part of our mission to change the way people see the world.

Planet is a global company with employees working remotely world wide and joining us from offices in San Francisco, Washington DC, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, and The Netherlands.