Director of Structures and Mechanisms

Director of Structures and Mechanisms Location: Playa Vista, California (in-person, five days per week) The return lane isn’t going to build itself. Come build it with us. Outpost is an orbital logistics company rewriting the rules of global logistics by building reusable Earth-return vehicles that unlock in-space manufacturing, on-orbit warehousing, and 60-minute global delivery through space. Our CarryAll vehicle family returns payloads ranging from 200 kilograms to 10 metric tons, lands within 10 meters of its target, and can then be refurbished and launched again. One vehicle, many missions: responsive logistics and precision delivery for national security; commercial cargo moved with real cadence; R&D payloads flown, tested, and refined across repeatable cycles; and critical aid delivered where roads and runways can’t reach. The demand is already here, validated through defense and civil agreements and supported by a growing pipeline of government and commercial customers. We have the customers, the team, and a clear technical path ahead of us. We’re building the return lane. Come build it with us. The Role The Director of Structures and Mechanisms is the executive technical leader for all primary structures, secondary structures, and deployable mechanisms across Outpost's Carryall vehicle. This role combines deep structural engineering expertise with leadership you will build, scale, and lead a multi-disciplinary team of structures, mechanisms, and mechanical engineers while owning the architecture, analysis, qualification, and flight certification of the entire structural system. Unlike traditional space vehicle roles where the structure simply needs to survive launch, you are designing for the round trip: launch vibration, the harsh vacuum of orbit, and the extreme thermal and mechanical loads of hypersonic re-entry and landing. You will own the technical execution of every structural element on the vehicle, with full accountability to executive leadership for overall flight readiness. We need a proven leader with the deep intuition that comes from seeing hardware fly (and fail), and the management experience to scale a world-class team around that expertise. Responsibilities Build, grow, and lead the Structures & Mechanisms organization. Recruit, mentor, and develop engineers across multiple sub-disciplines (primary structure, mechanisms, TPS, analysis). Serve as the final sign-off for the structural architecture of the vehicle, including primary structure, interfaces to the deployable heatshield, secondary structures, deployable mechanisms, and payload bay. Partner cross-functionally to resolve system-level trades. Represent Structures in executive reviews, customer milestone reviews, and with government stakeholders. Establish and enforce analysis standards across the team, hand calculations, FEA (ANSYS/FEMAP/NASTRAN), stiffness, buckling, fatigue, and thermal expansion compatibility. Be the final technical check on margin policy and verification logic. Own the release process and quality bar for mechanical manufacturing drawings and geometric dimensioning and tolerancing (ASME Y14.5) across the department. Coordinate with the production team on structural qualification campaign end-to-end, static load, random vibration, shock, deployment, and environmental testing, to certify hardware for flight. Coordinate with the production team to stablish strategic relationships with machine shops, composite vendors, and external partners. Support make-vs-buy decisions and ensure supply chain resilience for precision flight hardware. Brief the CEO, board, customers, and government partners on structural design, risk posture, and program status. Qualifications Bachelor's degree or higher in Mechanical, Aerospace, or Structural Engineering. 10+ years of experience in the design and analysis of complex aerospace structures and mechanisms, with at least 3+ years in a management or technical leadership role leading multi-disciplin…