Electrical Engineer: Power Distribution & Controls
First Order Effects
Electrical Engineer: Power Distribution & Controls
First Order Effects
Defense hardware and infrastructure
Electrical Engineer: Power Distribution & Controls
Infrastructure for the Autonomous Era · First in. First up.
On-site · Austin, TX
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MESH is a system full of energy that has to be moved, measured, and controlled without ever putting a sailor or a load at risk. You design the command and control PCBAs and the power distribution that tie the generator, batteries, inverter, and loads into one coordinated system. This is the electrical backbone of the product, and you own it.
First Order Effects (FOE) is building America's Infrastructure Prime for the robotic era. Autonomous ships, drones, and robots are rewriting how the world moves, fights, and builds - but none of them work without infrastructure to power them, connect them, and launch and recover them. That's what we build.
Our team comes from SpaceX, Anduril, Saronic, Lockheed Skunk Works, Forterra, and Fuse Energy. Before founding FOE, we built satellite ground stations that closed a national comms gap in days, deployed multi-megawatt power systems at commercial speed, and shipped autonomous surface vessels into Navy fleet production. We've built infrastructure at lightspeed before - now we're applying that playbook to an entire company.
Design the command and control PCBAs that orchestrate MESH: generator start and stop, contactor and relay control, interlocks, and I/O.
Design power distribution from the genset and battery through to the loads: busbars, contactors, breakers, fusing, and protection.
Design the current and voltage sensing and metering the firmware reads, at the accuracy the mission needs.
Own schematic capture, drive PCB layout, DFM, bring-up, and test.
Partner with power electronics, battery, and firmware on interfaces, protection, and safety.
Take analog and digital board design from schematic through bring-up, on hardware that ships.
Build power distribution and protection that holds up at real current and voltage.
Go deep on sensing and instrumentation: current shunts, hall sensors, isolated measurement, ADC front ends.
Work in a modern EDA tool such as Altium or KiCad, and directly with fab and assembly houses.
Experience with high-voltage DC, battery systems, or genset controls.
A background in functional safety, protection coordination, or EMC design.
Exposure to maritime or defense hardware.
$100,000–$250,000 base + founding-team equity sized for the role + benefits. If you're an outlier, we'll pay like it.
To conform to U.S. Government export regulations (ITAR/EAR), applicants must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident, or protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3). Candidates must be eligible to obtain and maintain a U.S. security clearance; active clearance not required.
FOE is an Equal Opportunity Employer; employment with FOE is governed on the basis of merit, competence and qualifications and will not be influenced in any manner by race, color, religion, gender, national origin/ethnicity, veteran status, disability status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, mental or physical disability or any other legally protected status.
Sovereignty is built, not declared — come build it with us.
Defense hardware and infrastructure
First Order Effects is a defense technology company building hardware for autonomous systems. The company designs and manufactures expeditionary infrastructure and equipment that supports unmanned platforms in field environments. It serves defense organizations and teams deploying autonomous systems. Its operating model centers on engineering, manufacturing, testing, and field-support work organized around deployable products. Teams work across mechanical and electrical engineering, manufacturing, software, testing, supply chain, and field operations. The organization combines defense technology expertise with practical delivery for mission operators.
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