Director, Aerostructures X-BAT

Job details

Work model

On-site

Salary

$210,000 - $320,000

Location

Seattle, Washington

Hiring context

How this role compares at Shield AI

Shield AI has 480 live roles in MeritLog’s catalog across 12 job families, and 375 of them are in engineering. 376 of those listings publish a pay range, a disclosure rate of 78%.

This role's posted range of $210,000 - $320,000 sits above 87% of the 355 other Shield AI roles quoted over the same currency and period.

Counted across the job boards MeritLog tracks, at the time this page was served. Pay comparisons use only listings that publish a complete range in the same currency and period.

Job description

Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include Hivemind autonomy software, V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and Aechelon simulation and synthetic reality technologies. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube.  Job Description: Shield AI was founded to protect service members and civilians with intelligent systems. We are building the world’s best AI pilot and the aircraft that enable autonomy at scale. Our technology operates in complex, contested environments where GPS and communications may be denied, degraded, or unavailable. The technology we build demands cross-functional teaming and collaborative execution to solve the hardest problems in autonomy, aerospace engineering, and robotics. Engineers at Shield AI do not work in silos - they work shoulder-to-shoulder across disciplines to rapidly move from concept to flight-ready systems deployed in the real world.   X-BAT represents the next generation of autonomous airpower: a runway-independent, AI-piloted aircraft designed to execute missions in highly contested environments. Powered by Hivemind, Shield AI’s combat-proven autonomy stack, X-BAT combines long-range performance, survivability, and autonomous mission execution into a scalable operational platform.   As Director of Aerostructures for X-BAT, you will lead the strategy, architecture, development, integration, and scaling of advanced aircraft structures across one of the most ambitious autonomous aviation programs in the industry. You will oversee multidisciplinary structural engineering teams responsible for metallic and composite primary structures, subsystem integration, manufacturability, structural analysis, and flight-worthy execution from prototype through production. This role requires a technically elite aerospace leader who thrives in fast-moving environments, can build and scale high-performing engineering organizations, and is energized by solving complex problems that directly impact national security.