{"id":183698,"url":"https://alion.io/job/espace-senior-ground-software-engineer","title":"Senior Ground Software Engineer","company":{"id":2438005,"name":"E-Space","domain":"e-space.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/e-space-com","size_band":"201-500","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Lever","truth_index":{"grade":"C","score":69,"open_postings":105,"ghost_share":0.505,"stale_share":0,"repost_share":0.038,"time_to_fill_p50_days":52,"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"senior","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Saratoga, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":{"min_usd":154000,"max_usd":281000,"period":"year","method":"role_seniority_country_remote_cell","sample_n":3287},"experience_years_min":5,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Apache Kafka","optional":false},{"name":"Asyncio","optional":false},{"name":"AWS","optional":false},{"name":"CI/CD","optional":false},{"name":"FastAPI","optional":false},{"name":"gRPC","optional":false},{"name":"InfluxDB","optional":false},{"name":"Kubernetes","optional":false},{"name":"MQTT","optional":false},{"name":"OpenTofu","optional":false},{"name":"PostgreSQL","optional":false},{"name":"Pydantic","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"SQLAlchemy","optional":false},{"name":"Terraform","optional":false},{"name":"Time Series Forecasting","optional":false},{"name":"TimescaleDB","optional":false},{"name":"Grafana","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2025-10-24T03:15:58Z","employer_posted_date":"2025-10-24","last_verified_at":"2026-10-17T08:23:33Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":358,"trust":{"level":"ghost","repost_count":1,"flags":["stale","company_stale"],"days_open":358},"description":"What is the role?\nE-Space is looking for a Senior Software Engineer to join our Ground Software team. You will collaborate with multidisciplinary engineering teams to build the mission-critical software that powers our satellite constellation operations. You will develop highly available, highly-scalable backend systems using Python in an API-first, event-driven architecture deployed in the cloud using containerized solutions.\nWorking on greenfield projects, you'll be responsible for the entire software development lifecycle-from system design and architecture to hands-on coding and infrastructure implementation. This role combines technical leadership with deep engineering work, making foundational decisions that will scale with our growing constellation.\nWhat you will be doing:\nArchitect and scale a Python-based Ground Data System designing microservices that handle real-time command uplink, telemetry downlink, and event processing across a growing constellation \nBuild binary protocol pipelines for CCSDS-compliant spacecraft communication, including TC/TM framing, CFDP file transfers, and AES encryption/decryption \nOwn the messaging infrastructure to evaluate and optimize MQTT broker architecture, and quantify performance bottlenecks (MQTT throughput, QoS tuning, database writes, CPU-bound encoding/decoding) \nBuild high-performance APIs for mission-critical command and control operations\nCreate workflow orchestration systems for automated satellite and ground procedures\nIntegrate with ground station networks and cloud infrastructure to develop scalable data ingestion and processing pipelines for high-rate satellite telemetry and command streams\nEstablish software engineering and DevOps best practices including code reviews, testing standards, and architectural guidelines\nCollaborate cross-functionally with Flight Software, Payload, and Mission Operations Teams \nWhat you bring to the role:\n5+ years of backend software engineering experience building scalable, fault-tolerant systems for telemetry ingestion, command & control, or real-time data processing at scale \nProficiency with microservices architecture, message queues, gRPC, and protobufs\nExpert Python skills with experience with modern frameworks (FastAPI, Pydantic, SQLAlchemy), asynchronous programming (asyncio, threading), API development \nKnowledge of CCSDS protocols (TC, TM, CFDP) or willingness to learn space communication standards quickly\nTime-series databases (InfluxDB, TimescaleDB, or similar at high ingest rates) \nKubernetes production experience (HPA, resource management, networking, debugging pods at scale) Experience designing and implementing event-driven architectures and workflow orchestration systems\nSolid understanding of AWS services, PostgreSQL, and container-based deployment solutions\nHands-on experience with CI/CD pipelines, automated testing, and modern software development practices\nExperience with message bus systems (Kafka, MQTT) and in-memory databases for real-time data processing\nKnowledge of Infrastructure as Code (Terraform/OpenTofu), monitoring/observability tools, and high-availability system design\nExperience with high-throughput data processing and performance optimization for mission-critical applications\nStrong system design skills with ability to make architectural decisions for scalable distributed systems\nBonus Points for the following:\nBachelor's degree in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or equivalent\nExperience with Kubernetes and container orchestration platforms\nKnowledge of time-series databases\nBackground in satellite operations, mission control systems, aerospace, defense, or other mission-critical industries \nGrafana/observability stack for distributed systems monitoring Strong intellectual curiosity and commitment to continuous learning\nExceptional attention to detail and an ownership mentality\nAdditional Requirements\nThis is a fast-paced, high-impact environment - flexibility to occasionally work extended hours or weekends during critical periods is expected.","description_format":"text","description_chars":4046,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":5,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":{"level":"bachelor","optional":false},"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["Continuous learning"],"hiring_locations":[],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Space & Aerospace","Satellite Manufacturing"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-01T08:47:55Z"},{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-26T03:57:40Z"},{"event":"reopen","at":"2026-10-14T07:11:13Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":7,"band":"cold","label":"Long shot","p_open":1,"p_active":0.267,"p_room":0.28,"age_days":358,"expected_fill_days":52,"reasons":["conf:0","stale_co","velocity","ghost","win:tail","crowd:brand"],"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"},"pay":null,"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/espace-senior-ground-software-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/espace-senior-ground-software-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-17T10:50:49Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":14223,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-10-18T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":2438005},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=2438005"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fespace-senior-ground-software-engineer"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fespace-senior-ground-software-engineer"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fespace-senior-ground-software-engineer"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/espace-senior-ground-software-engineer\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fespace-senior-ground-software-engineer"}]}