Aircraft Configuration & Layout Engineer

This role owns the authoritative 3D configuration of autonomous aircraft, resolving spatial conflicts between subsystems and maintaining the weight-and-balance baseline from concept through preliminary design. You'll define aircraft geometry, integrate subsystems, run performance and sizing analyses, and hold the configuration baseline across disciplines. You'll also benchmark competitor and adversary unmanned systems to ground configuration trades in real-world data.

Responsibilities

• Define aircraft geometry, layout & general arrangement. Develop and refine 3D configurations, outer mold lines (OML), and general arrangements from concept through preliminary design review.
• Integrate the subsystems. Direct the physical placement of propulsion, fuel/energy storage, landing gear, avionics, sensors, communications, and weapons or specialized payloads — resolving the spatial trades between them.
• Manage internal volume and CG. Optimize packaging density, preserve maintenance access, and keep the design inside its operational center-of-gravity envelope.
• Run performance and sizing analysis. Build aerodynamic drag buildups, range/endurance and mission-profile analyses, and payload-range trades across the operational envelope.
• Own the mass properties baseline. Establish and maintain the program weight & balance baseline — current estimate vs. target mass, moments of inertia, and mass growth allowances.
• Execute rapid trade studies. Quantify how geometry, wing sweep/aspect ratio, engine selection, and payload integration move overall mission capability.
• Hold the configuration baseline. Establish, control, and communicate the authoritative configuration baseline across aerodynamics, structures, avionics, flight controls, and manufacturing.
• Resolve integration conflicts. Act as the primary technical interface between discipline leads to catch spatial, weight, dynamic, and thermal conflicts early in the design cycle.
• Lead configuration reviews. Build the configuration-focused data packages and presentations for SRR, SDR, and PDR milestones.
• Benchmark the competition. Analyze OSINT, defense publications, and market data to model competitor and adversary configurations — speed, range, loiter, payload, signature — and feed capability-gap findings into roadmap trades and business development.

Requirements

• Degree in Aerospace Engineering or equivalent, with real depth in aircraft configuration and layout.
• A track record owning aircraft configuration or general arrangement through preliminary design — you've held a baseline, not just contributed to one.
• Fluency with 3D CAD for full-aircraft layout (not just individual parts) and configuration-level packaging trades.
• Strong command of aircraft performance: drag buildup, sizing, range/endurance, mission analysis.
• Hands-on weight & balance / mass properties management, tracking mass growth against target.
• Comfort making defensible engineering calls under uncertainty at startup velocity.
• Eligible to obtain and maintain a Canadian security clearance (Secret or higher).

Nice to have

• Experience with uncrewed or attritable platforms, or unconventional configurations.
• Competitive intelligence / threat benchmarking of unmanned systems from open-source data.
• CG-driven layout on ISR, loyal-wingman, or contested-environment platforms.
• Arctic or cold-weather design considerations (icing, materials, field logistics).
• Exposure to RCAF, DND, or NATO airworthiness pathways for uncrewed systems.

Benefits

• Competitive base salary and company equity*
• Comprehensive health benefits
• Additional equity granted based on impact*