Customer Delivery Engineer at Loft Orbital in San Francisco, CA

Wanna join the adventure?

Customer Delivery Engineers (CDEs) own the end-to-end deployment and execution of customer satellite missions at Loft. We serve as the primary technical interface to our customers and translate mission objectives into operational reality, from early requirements and ConOps development through commissioning, on-orbit operations, and continuous improvement.

CDEs operate real spacecraft and work directly with customers to build mission applications on top of Loft’s API and operational infrastructure. You will translate mission objectives into executable workflows, configurations, and tooling that ensure reliable, scalable on-orbit execution. You will sit at the intersection of satellite operations, customer engineering, software development, systems engineering, and program execution, delivering meaningful outcomes for every mission you support.

About this role:

• Serve as the primary technical interface for customer missions, aligning on objectives, managing expectations, and ensuring mission success
• Own the full mission lifecycle, from requirements definition and ConOps design through launch, commissioning, on-orbit execution, anomaly triage, and long-term optimization
• Operate Loft spacecraft and payloads on orbit, driving mission execution, anomaly resolution, and performance optimization across the fleet
• Work directly with customers to design and implement mission applications on Loft’s API and operational framework, enabling effective and scalable on-orbit operations
• Develop mission tooling and automation in Python to improve reliability, adoption, and operational scale
• Translate operational experience and customer feedback into concrete product improvements and roadmap input

Must Haves:

• 3+ years of experience in an operational engineering environment, such as satellite operations, forward deployed engineering, production infrastructure, backend or platform engineering for live products, or other mission-critical systems
• Experience owning or significantly contributing to production systems operating in real-world, mission-critical environments
• Experience diagnosing and resolving issues in complex, multi-layered systems by tracing failures across interfaces and dependencies
• Strong Python scripting skills and comfort building automation for operational systems
• Experience working across software systems, APIs, and infrastructure such as Docker or similar DevOps environments
• Ability to operate effectively in dynamic, high-pressure environments where requirements evolve and real-time decisions matter
• Strong communication skills and experience working directly with customers or cross-functional stakeholders

Nice to Haves:

• Experience with satellite operations, spacecraft commissioning, or AIT
• Experience with spacecraft subsystems such as guidance and control, power systems, or communications systems
• Experience integrating external systems into larger operational architectures
• Experience with configuration languages such as CUE
• Experience operating within a full product lifecycle, translating real-world usage and feedback into system or tooling improvements
• Experience working with international or cross-cultural teams

Some of Our Awesome Benefits:

• 100% company-paid medical, dental, and vision insurance option for employees and dependents
• Flexible Spending (FSA) and Health Savings (HSA) Accounts offered with an employer contribution to the HSA
• 100% employer paid Life, AD&D, Short-Term, and Long-Term Disability insurance
• Flexible Time Off policy for vacation and sick leave, and 12 paid holidays
• 401(k) plan and equity options
• Daily catered lunches and snacks in office
• International exposure to our team in France
• Fully paid parental leave; 14 weeks for birthing parent and 10 weeks for non-birthing parent
• Carrot Fertility provides comprehensive, inclusive fertility healthcare and family-forming benefits with financial support
• Off-sites and many social events and celebrations
• Relocation assistance when applicable

* Research shows that while men apply to jobs where they meet an average of 60% of the criteria, women and other underrepresented people tend to only apply when they meet 100% of the qualifications. At Loft, we value respectful debate and people who aren’t afraid to challenge assumptions. We strongly encourage you to apply, even if you don’t check all the boxes.

Who We Are

Loft: Space Made Simple.

Founded in 2017, Loft provides governments, companies, and research institutions with a fast, reliable, and simple way to deploy missions in orbit.

We integrate, launch, and operate spacecraft, offering end-to-end missions as a service across Earth observation, IoT connectivity, on-orbit AI, national security missions, and more. Leveraging our existing space infrastructure and an extensive inventory of satellite buses, Loft is reducing years-long integration and launch timelines to months. With more than 30 missions flown, Loft’s flight heritage and proven technologies enable customers to focus on their mission objectives.

With a growing fleet on track to reach 30 satellites by 2027, we are scaling up quickly across our offices in San Francisco, CA | Golden, CO | and Toulouse, France to meet accelerating demand for space infrastructure.

As an international company your resume will be reviewed by people across our offices so please attach a copy in English.