Data Engineer III at Iridium in Chandler, AZ

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.

What We’re Looking For:

If you are experienced in data engineering, cloud-based data platforms, and enterprise data modernization, and have 5+ years of experience designing and supporting scalable data solutions, then you will be excited about the Data Engineer opening with Iridium on our Enterprise Data team. As a Data Engineer III, you'll be responsible for delivering high-quality work that advances Iridium's enterprise data modernization and consolidation initiatives, ensuring scalable, reliable, and secure data foundations that support evolving business needs. In this role, you will focus primarily on designing and optimizing cloud-based data pipelines, ingestion frameworks, and data models that power analytics, reporting, operational insights, and more real-time data delivery, including modernization of QoS-related data pipelines. You will thrive in this role if you enjoy solving complex technical challenges, working with cross-functional partners, and building high-quality data infrastructure that drives strategic decision-making.

What You’ll Do:

• Contribute to the design, development, and optimization of scalable, reliable, and efficient data pipelines and ETL processes
• Build and enhance data ingestion frameworks using AWS services such as Glue and DataSync, along with platforms including Snowflake and DBT
• Support the implementation of strategies for ingesting structured and unstructured data from databases, APIs, and streaming sources, ensuring data quality, accuracy, and security
• Troubleshoot, diagnose, and resolve issues related to data pipelines and ingestion processes
• Develop and maintain data models to support analytics, reporting, and cross‑functional business needs
• Ensure adherence to data governance, compliance requirements, and security best practices
• Monitor, maintain, and optimize the health and performance of the data infrastructure to proactively identify bottlenecks or inefficiencies
• Work with cross‑functional teams to translate business requirements into scalable data solutions
• Support the onboarding and integration of QoS data initiatives, enabling more real‑time operational visibility

What You’ll Need to Succeed:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, or a related field.
• 5+ years of relevant experience in data engineering
• Prior experience in effectively collaborating and communicating with engineering teams and business stakeholders to build and maintain productive working relationships
• Strong proficiency in Snowflake, DBT, SQL, Python, and modern ETL/ELT frameworks
• Experience with data pipeline design, data modeling, streaming and batch ingestion technologies such as Kafka and NiFi/Openflow
• Hands‑on experience with AWS cloud services and data quality, governance, and performance‑tuning practices
• Ability to translate business requirements into scalable data architectures
• Telecom or satellite industry experience is a plus
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to set personal priorities and assist others in executing assigned tasks, with guidance; proactively communicates bandwidth issues to manager
• Good communication skills, with the ability to comfortably present products, deliverables, analyses, and/or issues to groups within your team
• Able to create, edit, and structure documents with minimal guidance
• Demonstrates active listening and asks substantive, thought-provoking questions
• Possess an analytical mindset, with the ability to understand key outputs of data analysis, make routine decisions using data, and recognize and propose solutions to issues
• Proactive in providing formal and informal feedback to peers and managers
• Facilitates teamwork, positively impacts team/peer group, and demonstrates ownership of assigned tasks and activities

Things That Would be Great if You Brought to the Table:

• Experience with data orchestration tools such as Airflow
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure‑as‑code, or data quality frameworks
• AWS certifications or Snowflake certifications

We’ll also need you to:

• Be able to work in the office at least 60% of the time (3 days per week) to foster collaboration with the team and stakeholders
• Be on call
• Must be a US Person

Work Environment:

This position primarily works in an office setting and is largely sedentary with the majority of the position working with a computer. The role typically requires the use of basic office equipment such as a phone, video, computer, keyboard, mouse, and printer.

We believe in-person connection drives innovation, strengthens mentorship, and builds culture, while flexibility enables employees to do their best work. Under Iridium’s Hybrid Work Policy, employees are expected to work at least three days per week (approximately 60%) in an Iridium office to support collaboration, relationship-building, and professional growth.

Additional Information

This job description outlines the general nature and level of work for this role and is not a comprehensive list of duties, responsibilities, or qualifications. Employees may be assigned additional responsibilities as needed.

Iridium is an Equal Opportunity Employer, including individuals with disabilities and protected veterans.