Director of Electrical Engineering

We are a fusion power company based in Everett, WA, with the mission to build the world's first fusion power plant, enabling a future with unlimited clean electricity. Our vision is a world with clean, reliable, and affordable energy for everyone.

Since Helion's founding in 2013, we have raised over $600 million from investors such as Sam Altman, Mithril, and Capricorn Investment Group to propel us forward. Our last prototype, Trenta, completed 10,000 high-power pulses and reached plasma temperatures of 100 million degrees Celsius (9 keV).

Now we are working toward Polaris, which will be the first machine to demonstrate electricity from fusion, making this a great time to join Helion! Bring your skills, experiences, and determination to make a difference in the world. Together, we can make a future with unlimited clean electricity from fusion a reality.

Helion is hiring a Director of Electrical Engineering to own electrical systems for Helion’s fusion generators. This position provides a unique opportunity to solve challenging multidisciplinary problems that are critical to deploying fusion energy to the world, while growing and mentoring a team of exceptional engineers and establishing design tools and processes to continually increase Helion’s pace of innovation.

What you’ll be doing

In this position, you will set the standard for how fast Helion designs and builds electrical systems and ultimately delivers clean, low-cost, and reliable electricity to the world. Your main responsibility will be creating a world-class engineering team and continually raising the bar for speed of execution and technical rigor. The role may expand based on interests and performance; initial responsibilities include –

• Managing the team’s end-to-end ownership of high-energy pulsed-power circuits (kV, MA, MJ)
• Managing the team’s end-to-end ownership of low-voltage support systems (e.g., gate triggers)
• Accelerating Helion’s development of custom semiconductor devices and grid tie-in hardware
• Collaborating with cross-functional teams to improve generator performance and reliability
• Developing and maintaining a roadmap to mass-production, optimizing for scalability and cost

About you

You have a bachelor’s degree in engineering, with a minimum of 10 years of engineering experience and 5 years of engineering management experience. You have taken multidisciplinary problems from concept to design, manufacture, test, and deployment. Some specific characteristics we are looking for –

• Autonomous ownership of complex engineering projects (including schedule ownership)
• Exceptional leadership of engineers with a wide range of experiences and backgrounds
• Hands-on exposure to a variety of electrical disciplines (silicon design, pulsed power, etc.)
• Ability to apply engineering first-principles and analytical rigor to challenging problems
• Success scaling complex systems while reducing design iteration time with a lean team

Compensation and Benefits

At Helion, we are committed to fostering a fair and equitable environment in every aspect of our operations, including compensation. We ensure all our roles are competitively benchmarked and our total compensation package includes a base salary, comprehensive benefits, and equity grants, giving you a true stake in Helion's success. Final compensation is determined through a holistic evaluation of your experience, qualifications, and our commitment to maintaining internal equity, ensuring fairness and transparency across our teams.

This is an exempt salaried role.

Annual Base Bay

$220,000 - $270,000 USD

Benefits

Our total compensation package includes benefits, including but not limited to:

• Medical, Dental, and Vision plans for employees and their families
• 31 Days of PTO (21 vacation days and 10 sick days)
• 13 Paid holidays, plus company-wide winter break
• Up to 5% employer 401(k) match
• Short term disability, long term disability, and life insurance
• Paid parental leave and support (up to 16 weeks)
• Annual wellness stipend

NOTE: Underrepresented people are less likely to apply unless they meet 100% of the job's requirements. We believe in hiring people, not checklists, and encourage you to apply even if you do not check all of the boxes. If this job isn't the one, we have many other openings that may be a fit.

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, disability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran status, or genetic information. If we reach out to you to begin an interview process, we will also ask if you require any reasonable accommodation at that time.