Lead Radar System Architect Remote · Contract-to-perm** About the Role You’ll own the architecture of a counter-UAV radar sensor — the waveform and detection strategy, and the system-level requirements and budgets that define it. You’ll drive the RF chain and transceiver architecture hand-in-hand with the antenna engineer, converging on what’s actually feasible to build — and you’ll set the direction the DSP work follows.
We’re hiring this as contract-to-perm — you start on contract, with an explicit track to a permanent lead role for the right person.
We’ve already proven the concept with a first-generation prototype. This role owns the redesign that carries those lessons into a production-grade sensor — architected deliberately from requirements up, with the systems planning to do it right the second time. You’ll work close to real hardware, including system bring-up and field testingin Kyiv (paid travel), so the architecture stays anchored in measured performance, not just models.
You should anchor the architecture in honest budgets and measured results over optimism —and know which unknowns to resolve first. What You’ll Do * Own the radar waveform and detection strategy — chirp/FMCW design, range-Doppler processing, detection budgets (SNR, integration, CFAR), and angle estimation — to detect small, low-RCS UAV targets at high closing velocity. * Define and maintain the system-level requirements and budgets — detection range, range/Doppler/angular resolution, update rate, power, thermal, and size — written to be verifiable, so that meeting them demonstrably validates the sensor. * Evaluate approaches across the integration spectrum — cascaded transceiver ICs, an integrated system-on-module, or a discrete RF front-end — and decide, with the antenna engineer, the channel count, LO/clock distribution, and phase-coherence strategy across the array, all bounded by what’s feasible to build. * Own and control the interfaces between subsystems — timing and synchronization (frame/trigger), the transceiver-to-compute data path (sample rates, formats, latency/throughput), and the RF/antenna boundary — keeping the ICDs current as the design evolves. * Just as important, look at the interfaces as a whole rather than pairwise, so the end-to-end signal chain from antenna to detection output holds together as one coherent system. * Own and continuously evolve the system model — effectively a digital twin of the sensor * checking whether performance still meets expectations as the design matures. * Grow model fidelity over time, introducing the non-idealities and non-linearities that matter as complexity increases (phase noise, PA compression, quantization, channel mismatch, mutual coupling), and trace observed behavior back to the impairmentresponsible. * Iterate with the DSP engineer on the waveform and detection design — you lead the strategy, they own the implementation and pressure-test it for compute load, memory, and timeline — until the architecture is both performant and buildable. * Converge the open architecture questions to decisions on a schedule — committing with the evidence available, revisiting only when new data (a budget, a measurement) actually changes the answer.
Required Qualifications * Radar systems you’ve architected and shipped end-to-end — from waveform and detection through the RF chain. * Strong grounding in radar detection theory — FMCW/chirp waveforms, range-Doppler processing, CFAR and SNR/integration, and angle estimation — plus enough target-tracking fluency to set the requirements it imposes (update rate, track accuracy), even though the DSP engineer implements it. * Hands-on MATLAB for system-level radar modeling (Radar Toolbox) — you’ve built and evolved system models, not just read their output. Simulink a plus. * Track record personally owning and closing the quantitative budgets — link and detection budgets above all — and holding the design to them. * RF chain architecture experience with multi-channel/MIMO transceivers — and the coherence challenges of scaling channel count, from LO/clock distribution to phase alignment across the array. * Able to work independently on a contract basis. * Must pass company security procedures * Must commuicate effectively in English
Preferred / Bonus * Counter-UAV or defense radar experience specifically — small, low-RCS, maneuvering targets in cluttered environments. * Hands-on experience with integrated radar transceiver SoCs and the integration tradeoffs they bring.
Engagement Details * Type: Contract-to-perm * starts as a contract engagement with an explicit track to a permanent lead role for the right candidate. * Rate: [TBD] * Duration: [TBD] * Location: Remote/Hybrid. * Hybrid: Must be able to temporary travel to Kyiv for on-site testing is heavily preferred (all expenses paid) — system bring-up and field validation against real targets, correlating measured performance against the model. * Start: ASAP
