Hardware Engineer

A European defense and aerospace company is hiring a Founding Hardware Engineer for its Vilnius office. We design miniature radar seekers. Everything has to fit on a single board: high-frequency RF, high-speed digital lines, and dense power regulation — while keeping digital noise out of the analog front-end. If it doesn’t, the radar goes blind. Thermal density, EMI, and tight mechanical constraints have to be solved together.
 

We are looking at candidates in Vilnius and elsewhere in Europe. Relocation is fully covered: move, housing, and official employment.
 

Main Responsibilities

• Own the physical board end-to-end, from schematic to bench bring-up.
• Select components against real stock and lead times — no waiting 10 weeks for a PMIC.
• Design the multi-layer stackup (6 layers) and calculate impedance.
• Route RF traces, high-speed digital lines, and the power delivery network.
• Define via stitching, RF cans, and the grounding scheme.
• Align board outlines and thermals directly with the mechanical engineer.
• Make minor revisions to the existing V1 board (schematic and purchased chips are already in place).
• Design the V2 radar boards from scratch. Form factor: a module of 3 round PCBs that fits inside the drone’s nose radome.
• Bring the board up in the lab when it returns from fabrication. Debug with a scope and a soldering iron.
   

Mandatory Requirements

• Independently designed 5+ boards, solo, end-to-end.
• Proficient in Altium or KiCad.
• Hands-on experience probing and soldering your own boards. Simulation-only or outsourced layout is not a fit.
• Background in one of: telecom / 5G, high-complexity IoT, electronic warfare, UAV avionics, or automotive radar.
• One full-cycle engineer who combines layout and RF. We will not hire a layout engineer and an RF engineer separately, and we will not consider an RF engineer without layout experience.
• Self-taught candidates are welcome if they can show strong, low-level signal integrity and PCB design.
• Be ready to walk through screenshots of your most complex past layouts in the interview.
• Work on-site daily in the Vilnius lab.
   

We offer

• Top-of-market base salary.
• Founding equity.
• Full relocation package (move, housing, official employment) for candidates relocating from other cities or countries.
• Daily allowance.
• Logistics handled so you can focus on the hardware.