GNC Aerospace Engineer (Navigation specialist)

CoAspire (https://www.coaspire.com) is a cutting-edge defense manufacturing leader in Northern Virginia, specializing in the precision assembly of advanced weapons systems. With over twelve years of a legacy of innovation, we're at the forefront of building reliable, affordable mass weapons that protect and empower our nation’s warfighters. Our tight-knit team thrives in a collaborative environment where safety, quality, and work-life balance come first with a focus on professional growth at our new 27,000 sq. ft. facility. Join us to make a tangible impact on mission-critical technology while enjoying Northern Virginia's vibrant community.

Position: You will perform a key analytical and modeling role in navigation system design, algorithm development, and performance characterization for our weapons systems. Working closely with multidisciplinary engineering teams, you will develop high-fidelity navigation models and sensor fusion architectures to ensure robust positioning and guidance across all flight phases - including environments where GPS is unavailable, degraded, or denied.

Responsibilities:

• Develop, validate, and implement GPS-denied navigation algorithms, including INS/IMU integration, terrain-aided navigation (TAN), visual odometry, and map-matching techniques.
• Generate navigation error budgets and covariance analyses for use in 6-DoF trajectory simulations and end-to-end mission performance models.
• Perform navigation performance trade studies, mission analysis, and flight envelope assessments across GPS-denied and GPS-degraded scenarios (e.g., urban canyons, contested environments, subsurface/tunnel ingress).
• Create and interpret navigation performance charts such as CEP/miss distance vs. flight time, INS drift characterization curves, and sensor fusion filter residual analyses.
• Conduct observability analysis, filter tuning, and covariance consistency evaluation for Extended Kalman Filter (EKF), Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF), or particle filter architectures.
• Support multidisciplinary design optimization (MDO) efforts, including integration of navigation models with guidance laws, flight control systems, and seeker/sensor payloads.
• Assist engineering leadership in diagnosing navigation performance anomalies, evaluating sensor trade-offs, and recommending algorithm or architecture improvements.
• Prepare clear technical documentation, analysis summaries, charts, and presentations for internal reviews and external stakeholders.
• Contribute to process improvements by recommending advanced estimation techniques, navigation toolchains, simulation frameworks, or workflow enhancements.

Qualifications:

• At least 5 years of experience in navigation systems engineering applied to aerospace or defense platforms, with demonstrated expertise in GPS-denied/degraded navigation, inertial navigation, and sensor fusion.
• Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related field.
• Strong programming skills for algorithm development and analysis (e.g., MATLAB/Simulink, and C ).
• Experience developing and validating strapdown INS mechanization, IMU error modeling, and sensor calibration methods.
• Strong background in estimation and filtering theory, including EKF/UKF design, observability analysis, and covariance propagation.
• Strong analytical mindset with rigorous attention to validation, verification, and engineering accuracy.
• U.S. citizenship and ability to obtain and maintain security clearance or background-screening requirements.
• Comfortable working in a fast-paced, collaborative, team-oriented environment.

Desired Skills:

• Master's or Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or related field with focus on navigation, or estimation theory.
• Experience with multidisciplinary design optimization (MDO) frameworks and tools.
• Prior work on weapon systems, missiles or other defense/aerospace platforms.
• Familiarity with high-performance computing (HPC) for large-scale CFD simulations.

Beyond competitive pay, we offer:

• Full benefits from day one: medical, dental and vision
• 401(k) with generous company match and immediate vesting
• PTO and Federal holidays

Apply now! We're reviewing applications on a rolling basis. Let's build the future together. No agencies, please.

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