---
title: 'Navigation Engineer, GNC at Furientis'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/navigation-engineer-gnc-furientis-los-angeles-92ks7pqn8vh5'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-10'
---

# Navigation Engineer, GNC at Furientis

- **Company:** Furientis
- **Location:** Los Angeles, CA
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-05-14
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-10
- **Apply:** https://jobs.lever.co/furientis/9bb3c0f7-8a1b-47ef-9734-899e27b359b7

## Job description

America is critically deficient in production of defensive munitions- we currently produce shipborne interceptors in the few hundreds per year while our adversaries are producing offensive threats in the tens of thousands per year. Furientis was started to help solve this problem- introducing a new class of cost-effective, high production rate, interceptor missiles. We're seeking motivated individuals who internalize this problem and are eager to apply their past experience in similar industries (aerospace, defense, automotive/racing, robotics) and out of the box thinking to solve this problem for the US and its allies.

## About the Team

The GNC team writes the guidance algorithms, navigation solution, and autopilot that take a launched interceptor from rail to intercept under realistic noise, disturbances, and adversary behavior. On a modern missile, GNC decides whether the rest of the system's investment converts into a hit. We treat the navigation solution as the load-bearing wall every guidance and control decision rests on.

## What You'll Do

- Design, tune, and harden an error-state EKF for tight INS/GNSS coupling, with graceful degradation under GNSS denial, jamming, and spoofing.
- Characterize inertial sensors: bias, scale factor, misalignment, g-sensitivity, random walks, Allan variance, and temperature behavior across the envelope.
- Own the navigation error budget across sensor noise, calibration residuals, lever arms, time sync, vibration rectification, and high-g transients. Flow requirements down to suppliers and up to miss-distance.
- Develop pre-launch alignment and in-flight alignment procedures (gyrocompass, transfer alignment, motion-based observability injection) suitable for tactical timelines.
- Integrate aiding sensors as needed (GNSS, magnetometer, baro, vision, terrain-referenced, star tracker) and write the observability and fault-detection logic that decides when to trust them.
- Build the full nav simulation stack: truth models, sensor error models, Earth and gravity models, Monte Carlo harness, and HWIL bench with real IMUs and GNSS receivers under motion.
- Implement the navigation filter in flight-grade C/C++, with deterministic timing, fixed-step execution, and numerical conditioning suitable for a flight processor.
- Plan and execute environmental qualification of the inertial assembly per MIL-STD-810 and program environments, with attention to vibration rectification and coning/sculling error.
- Stand up the navigation HWIL from zero: rate table, three-axis motion simulator, GNSS RF simulator, and a bench that exercises the IMU filter against injected faults.

## Skills We're Hiring For

- B.S. in Aerospace, Electrical, Mechanical Engineering, Applied Math, Physics, or related. M.S. or Ph.D. preferred.
- 7+ years of navigation or estimation work, with responsibility for one production navigation filter from architecture through flight test.
- Designed and tuned an EKF (error-state or full-state) from first principles, not just consumed a vendor's nav solution. You can defend your state vector, process noise, measurement model, and observability at the whiteboard.
- Deep fluency with strapdown inertial navigation: quaternion and DCM mechanizations, coning and sculling, Earth and gravity models (WGS-84, J2+), and frame conventions (ECEF, ECI, NED, body).
- Hands-on inertial sensor characterization: Allan variance, temperature calibration, g-sensitivity, scale factor and misalignment estimation, vibration rectification.
- GNSS at receiver-output and signal-processing level: tight vs. loose coupling, RAIM, anti-jam and anti-spoof considerations, and realistic expectations under denial.
- Flight-grade C/C++ (or Rust) for embedded targets. Comfortable with fixed-step real-time execution, numerical conditioning of covariance matrices, and the difference between a prototype and a flight build.
- Python (NumPy/SciPy) for modeling and Monte Carlo. Able to stand up a harness with noise-source ablation and defend the results.
- Bias for low-cost navigation: track record of meeting miss-distance requirements with MEMS IMUs where the legacy approach reached for a tactical-grade FOG or RLG. Filter sophistication can buy back sensor grade.
- AI-native working style: daily use of agentic coding tools (Claude Code, Codex, or similar) for filter scaffolding, Monte Carlo analysis, and report generation.

Bonus Points For

- Direct flight experience on a tactical missile, munition, or interceptor navigation system.
- High-g navigation experience (sustained launch loads, gun-launched munitions, or hard-impact events).
- Transfer alignment from a moving host platform (air-launched or ship-launched).
- GNSS-denied navigation: vision-aided, terrain-referenced, celestial, signals-of-opportunity, or magnetic-anomaly.
- Production transition: moved a nav solution from prototype to volume manufacturing, including factory calibration flow.
- Technical vendor relationships across the inertial and GNSS supply chain (tactical-grade IMUs, MEMS arrays, GNSS receivers, antennas).
- Hobbyist drone or rocketry build and flight experience that translates to sensor packaging, vibration, and field-handling intuition.

Eligibility & Logistics Location: On-site at our Los Angeles, CA HQ; remote work is not available. Monthly weekend travel for test events and supplier engagements. Clearance: A clearance is not required for this position. Must be a U.S. Person. Equal Opportunity & Export Compliance Furientis is an equal-opportunity employer. To comply with U.S. export control laws, employment is contingent on eligibility to access export-controlled information.

## About Furientis

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Furientis is a defense technology startup building low-cost, production-scalable interceptor missile systems for the U.S. military.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Pre-seed)
- **Headquarters**: El Segundo, California, USA (operates out of a facility in Playa Vista, Los Angeles)
- **Founded**: 2025
- **Founders**: Brody Franzen (CEO) and Aris Simsarian

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Aerospace & Defense / Defense Technology
- **Target customers**: U.S. military and defense organizations, particularly naval and ship-based interceptor procurement buyers
- **Mission or purpose statement**: "We believe the future of warfare is dictated by production capacity, and our current system of manufacturing critical defensive munitions cannot meet demand." The company aims to build cost-effective defensive munitions at scale.

## Products & Services
- **F 1.0 Interceptor Missile System**: A low-cost interceptor missile architected for an annual production volume of 1,000 units per factory. Designed to counter low-cost threats (drones, cruise missiles) that are expensive to stop with legacy systems. Uses automotive-style materials and assembly processes, commercial off-the-shelf components, and in-house solid rocket motors to achieve a cost of ~$250,000 per missile versus the $1–$5 million normally spent per interceptor.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed (Private, early-stage)
- **Key Metric**: $5M total funding raised (Pre-Seed round, announced May 2026)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Silent Ventures (lead), Bessemer Venture Partners, Multiball Capital, SV Angel, Humba Ventures, BVVC, Liquid 2 Ventures, MVP Ventures, Channel 39 Ventures, Vanderbilt University, Gaingels. Angel investors include founders of Anduril, Armada, and Erebor.
- **Growth Signals**: Emerging from stealth with $5M pre-seed; completed six flight tests and ten static-fire tests within its first six months; named a finalist in the Office of Naval Research Tactical Missile Innovation Challenge; actively hiring with 4+ open roles; projected "significant demonstrations" later in 2026.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Design for manufacturing from day one**: Unlike legacy primes that spend a year on modeling before building hardware, Furientis runs four-week design cycles with monthly flight tests—a "build fast, test often" approach.
- **In-house solid rocket motor production**: Most primes outsource this critical component, creating supply chain bottlenecks. Furientis makes its own, giving it control over the most constrained piece of the supply chain.
- **Cost advantage**: Target price is ~$250,000 per missile vs. $1M–$5M for incumbent systems from primes like Lockheed Martin, enabled by automotive-style materials, off-the-shelf components, and simplified assembly.
- **Production scalability**: Designed from scratch for a throughput of 1,000 units per year per factory, addressing the core national security bottleneck of ammunition production capacity.

## Strategic Focus
- **Scale production**: Move from prototype flight testing to initial production tooling and build-out of a 9,000-square-foot Los Angeles factory.
- **Team expansion**: Actively hiring elite engineers across opto-mechanical, perception hardware, and finance roles to accelerate development.
- **Demonstrate to the Navy**: Use ongoing flight tests and the ONR challenge to secure a production contract with the U.S. Navy.
- **Prove the thesis**: Continue monthly flight tests to validate the cost and performance of its interceptor system.

## Why Work Here
- **High-impact mission**: Work directly on solving a critical U.S. national security shortage—the ability to produce defensive munitions at the volumes needed to counter modern threats.
- **Fast-paced engineering culture**: Four-week design cycles, monthly flight tests, and a "build and break things" mentality that contrasts with slow, traditional defense primes.
- **Elite team and mentorship**: Leadership includes veterans of Virgin Galactic, Virgin Orbit, and Castelion (a hypersonics startup that raised $350M). Advisors/investors include founders of Anduril and Armada—among the most successful modern defense startups.
- **On-site in Los Angeles**: Roles are on-site in the Playa Vista / El Segundo area. The office is notably located in Lenny Kravitz’s former studio.
- **Early-stage equity**: Joining at pre-seed stage ($5M raised) provides significant ownership potential for early engineers alongside a small, tight-knit team (11-50 employees).
- **Active hiring**: As of mid-2026, open roles include Senior Opto-Mechanical Engineer, Perception Hardware Integration Engineer, and Finance Manager.

## Sources
1. [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/furientis)
2. [Fortune (Exclusive launch article)](https://fortune.com/2026/05/14/furientis-missiles-defense-anduril-military-drone-interceptors/)
3. [PitchBook](https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/894465-28)
4. [Fusion42 Profile](https://scout.fusion-42.com/startups/ff72fe16-9489-4f67-ae18-a3c6dd66edd4)
5. [Clera](https://www.getclera.com/companies/furientis)

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