Your space-enabled career begins here

Senior Thermal Engineer – Satellite Payloads

Digantara is a leading Space Surveillance and Intelligence​ company focused on ensuring orbital safety and sustainability. With expertise in space-based detection, tracking, identification, and monitoring, Digantara provides comprehensive domain awareness across regimes, allowing end users to have actionable intelligence on a single platform. At the core of its infrastructure lies a sophisticated integration of hardware and software capabilities aligned with the key principles of situational awareness: perception (data collection), comprehension (data processing), and prediction (analytics). This holistic approach empowers Digantara to monitor all Resident Space Objects (RSOs) in orbit, fostering comprehensive domain awareness.

Digantara is seeking a highly skilled Senior Thermal engineer to join our dynamic team who is passionate about modelling, design, analysis of thermal environment for payload/satellite subsystems. In this role, the candidate leverages the expertise to design, develop and realize thermal control for payload/satellite subsystems.

Why Us?

• Competitive incentives, galvanizing workspace, blazing team, frequent outings—pretty much everything you have heard about a startup + you get to work on space technology.

• Hustle in a well-funded startup allowing you to take charge of your responsibilities and create your moonshot.

Ideal Candidate:

Someone with professional experience in design, analysis and implementation of thermal control systems for satellites operating Low Earth Orbit (LEO).

Responsibilities

• Create thermal models of payload/satellite subsystems and carry out simulations by determining appropriate boundary conditions.

• Select and implement active/passive thermal components to achieve optimal thermal performance in LEO.

• Analyse thermal interfaces, heat sinks for electronic packages/avionics and develop appropriate thermal control schemes.

• Generate thermal control system requirements in collaboration with system, mission, structures and avionics engineers and perform design trade-off studies.

• Work with hardware engineers to design and develop thermal control system and carryout extensive modelling of internal, external thermal environment for payload/satellite subsystems.

• Generate test plans, procedure and execute tests to validate thermal performance of subsystems.

Required Qualifications

• B.Tech/B.E, M.Tech/M.E or PhD in Mechanical/ Thermal/ Aerospace Engineering.Degrees in physics, materials science, or electrical engineering or any branches (with a focus on thermal management) can also be relevant if the candidate has experience in thermal analysis and modelling.

• 8+ years of professional experience in thermal design and analysis of complex engineering systems.

• Strong understanding of different heat transfer modes i.e., conduction, convection, radiation.

• Understanding of thermal management and implementation techniques.

• Proficiency in working with thermal analysis software packages i.e., NASTRAN, ESTRAN, IDEAS, Thermal Desktop, Ansys, or any equivalent.

• Experience with NX Space Systems Thermal is a must.

Preferred Skills

• Experience with thermal modelling, simulation, and validation through qualification tests i.e., thermal vacuum, thermal cycling, etc.

• Understanding of thermal design for electronic packages/avionics, thermal properties of materials and space environment considerations.

  Strong first principles thinking with a deep understanding of thermal design, analysis, implementation and testing.

• Proven experience in thermal design, analysis of payload/satellite subsystems.

• Familiarity with the unique challenges of the space environment and basic understanding of orbital mechanics.

• Experience in testing your own thermal designs.

General Requirements

• Ability to work in a mission-focused, operational environment.

• Ability to think critically and make independent decisions.

• Interpersonal skills to enable working in a diverse and dynamic team.

• Maintain a regular and predictable work schedule.

• Writing and delivering technical documents and briefings.

• Verbal and written communications skills as well as organizational skills.

• Travel occasionally as necessary.