Company Overview:
Allen Control Systems (ACS) is a cutting-edge defense startup founded by two former Navy electrical engineers with a proven track record in robotics and software. We are developing an autonomous gun turret using advanced computer vision and control systems to precisely detect, track, and neutralize enemy drones.
With an engineering-first culture, ACS values technical excellence and innovation. Backed by our founders' successful exits from two previous ventures acquired for a combined $180M in 2022, we are committed to ensuring that the groundbreaking technologies we develop will have a real-world impact.
About The Role:
We are looking for a Systems Reliability Engineer to join our team, focusing on system-level reliability, verification, and risk reduction for our next-generation autonomous weapon platforms. This role sits closer to systems engineering than a traditional full-time reliability function and is responsible for defining how we evaluate system performance, analyze test data, identify failure modes, and drive clear pass/fail conclusions across hardware and software. The ideal candidate is hands-on, technically rigorous, and able to own the full loop from test planning through analysis, with particular strength in structured validation, environmental and performance testing, and safety-minded systems thinking.
We’re hiring across multiple experience levels, including:
Associate Engineer
Engineer
Senior Engineer
Staff Engineer
Senior Staff Engineer
Your title and level will be determined based on your experience, skills, and the scope of responsibility appropriate for the role.
What You'll Do:
Define system-level reliability goals, risk-based verification priorities, and failure-focused evaluation criteria for autonomous weapon platforms.
Identify reliability-critical tests, stress cases, and operating conditions needed to expose failure modes before fielding.
Analyze test and field data to identify failure modes, performance limits, degradation patterns, and reliability risks, and translate results into clear technical conclusions and recommended actions.
Lead structured root-cause investigations for reliability failures across electrical, mechanical, software, and controls interfaces.
Develop methods for reliability trending, failure categorization, and corrective-action tracking so the team can measure reliability growth over time.
Support requirements verification by ensuring reliability risks, failure criteria, and hazard-informed concerns are reflected in system requirements and verification methods.
Work with systems, mechanical, electrical, and software engineers to improve design robustness, observability, maintainability, and failure tolerance.
Help define corrective actions, retest plans, and closure criteria for reliability-related issues.
Contribute to hazard, risk, and mishap-informed engineering work, including reliability-focused systems analysis aligned with MIL-HDBK-781 style thinking.
Drive a stronger reliability culture by improving failure ownership, analysis quality, corrective-action discipline, and technical follow-through across programs.
What You'll Need:
Bachelor's or Master's degree in Engineering or a related technical field.
3+ years of experience in reliability engineering, systems engineering, failure analysis, verification, or engineering analysis.
Familiarity with MIL-STD-882 or comparable system safety and risk-analysis frameworks.
Experience identifying failure modes, reliability risks, and corrective actions from test or field data.
Experience with environmental, performance, qualification, or durability-style testing and the practical challenges of collecting useful data in real test conditions.
Comfort working across mechanical, electrical, software, and systems teams to improve reliability and technical rigor.
You'll Stand Out:
Comfort working in a fast-paced startup environment with high ownership, incomplete information, and cross-functional technical responsibility.
Proven track record of improving reliability, failure response, or risk-informed engineering rigor in mission-critical systems.
Experience with requirements management in JAMA or DOORS.
Experience developing reliability measures such as MTBF and Operational Availability.
Intellectual curiosity driving you to consistently find failure patterns and weak assumptions that others would miss.
What We Offer:
Competitive salary
ACS Equity Package
Health, Dental, Vision Insurance
Paid Time Off
Allen Control Systems is an Equal Opportunity Employer, providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment. Allen Control Systems prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.
