Ground Software Engineer II, Arc Vehicle

About this role

Turning Space into a Transportation Layer for Earth

Who We Are:

Inversion builds advanced reentry systems to deliver next-generation capabilities from space.

Our mission is to make Earth radically more accessible by turning Low-Earth Orbit into an on-demand logistics domain. We see space not as a destination, but as a platform — one that unlocks unprecedented speed and global reach.

Our spacecraft are designed to deliver payloads anywhere on Earth in under an hour, operating through extreme reentry conditions and landing with high precision. These systems open the door to new ways of testing, delivering, and operating at hypersonic speeds.

Inherently dual-use, our technology is built to meet urgent national security needs while laying the groundwork for future commercial applications. Backed by leading investors including Y Combinator, Spark Capital, and Lockheed Martin Ventures, and working with partners such as the U.S. Space Force and NASA, Inversion is pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in space-based defense and logistics.

What You'll Do

As a Ground Software Engineer at Inversion, you will report directly to the Engineering Manager of Arc Vehicle Software. In this role, you will build, integrate, and test the mission control software, real-time telemetry processing pipelines, and data visualization tools required to operate and monitor the Arc vehicle. You will own the development of user interfaces and backend applications used in both test and operations.

Key Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain the backend architectures, telemetry parsers, and command pipelines that support ground operations and flight tests.

• Build highly reliable, low-latency operator displays and data visualization interfaces used during vehicle testing and missions.

• Develop, package, and deploy automated software tools to orchestrate and monitor Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) and Software-in-the-Loop (SIL) simulation runs.

• Define and implement communication protocol structures, serialization standards, and data definitions (e.g., JSON, Protobuf, YAML) between flight and ground hardware.

• Build and maintain high-rate time-series databases and data storage solutions for rapid post-test analysis and archive…