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Aerodynamic Engineer
Harmattan AILausanne
Apply About Us
Harmattan AI is a next-generation defense prime building autonomous and scalable defense systems. Following the close of a $200M Series B, valuing the company at $1.4 billion, we are expanding our teams and capabilities to deliver mission-critical systems to allied forces.
Our work is guided by clear values: building technologies with real-world impact, pursuing excellence in everything we do, setting ambitious goals, and taking on the hardest technical challenges. We operate in a demanding environment where rigor, ownership, and execution are expected.
Harmattan is seeking an Aerodynamic Engineer to help design, validate, and continuously improve the flight physics of our UAV and eVTOL platforms. You'll work across the full loop — from conceptual aerodynamic design and simulation, through physical testing, to the Python tooling that ties it all together — collaborating closely with the Mechanical and GNC teams.
Responsibilities
Aerodynamic Design & Analysis: Contribute to the aerodynamic layout and analysis of fixed-wing, multicopter, and eVTOL configurations, moving fluidly between low-fidelity methods (XFoil, OpenVSP, AVL) and higher-fidelity CFD depending on the stage of the design.
Testing & Validation: Support flight test and/or wind tunnel campaigns — helping define test cards, instrument prototypes, and run experiments — to validate simulation predictions against real-world data.
Python Tooling & Automation: Write Python to automate analysis workflows, process test/flight data, and connect design and simulation tools together into a smoother end-to-end pipeline.
Aero Database Generation: Generate and maintain aerodynamic databases and stability derivatives that the GNC team relies on for control law development and autopilot tuning.
Cross-functional Collaboration: Work closely with the Mechanical and GNC teams throughout the design cycle to make sure aerodynamic choices stay feasible, stable, and testable in practice.
Requirements
Education: B.S. or M.S. in Aerospace Engineering, Aeronautical Engineering, or a related field, with coursework or project experience touching aerodynamics or flight mechanics.
Aerodynamics & Flight Dynamics Knowledge: Solid grasp of aerodynamic fundamentals (lift, drag, stability) and flight dynamics, with enough intuition to reason about a design's behaviour before running a full simulation or test.
Python Proficiency: Comfortable scripting in Python (NumPy, SciPy, Pandas) to process data, automate repetitive analysis, and glue together different engineering tools.
Simulation or Testing Exposure: Hands-on experience with at least one side of the validation loop — either aerodynamic simulation (CFD, XFoil, OpenVSP, AVL) or physical/experimental testing (wind tunnel, flight test, prototyping).
CAD Familiarity: Comfortable navigating and making basic edits in SolidWorks or CATIA, enough to understand geometry constraints and communicate effectively with the Mechanical team.
Pragmatic, Hands-on Mindset: Happy moving across the full design-to-validation loop rather than staying in a single niche, and comfortable working in a small, fast-moving team.
Nice-to-have
French language skills.
Hands-on experience building or flying RC aircraft/drones.
Propeller design and integration with the airframe.
Aeroacoustics.
We look forward to hearing how you can help shape the future of autonomous defense systems at Harmattan AI.