Software Engineer Contractor Jobs in Oregon (NOW HIRING)

About the Role:

Planet's Mission Control is a web-based application that empowers spacecraft operators and analysts to monitor, control, and study our growing fleet of satellites. It is flanked by a number of distributed microservices that handle spacecraft scheduling, tasking, telemetry processing, and similar operational needs. Together, these services automate much of the day-to-day operations of Planet's fleet of satellites.

You'll be a part of a team that builds, maintains, and operates these tools. Our mission is to offer a seamless interface that enables spacecraft operators, analysts, and engineers at Planet to interact effortlessly with our assets in space. We strive to minimize operational burden, and to automate all aspects of satellite operations. You will be a part of a team that will support, enable and engage with the end users to iterate on these systems. In this role, you will resolve a broad array of engineering problems in a dynamic environment.

This is a full-time, remote position based in the United States or Canada. If located near an office, you are expected to work from that office 3 days per week.

Impact You'll Own:

• Maintain and augment the automation and services ultimately responsible for the operation of Planet's satellites. This includes but is not limited to:
• Manage cloud-based infrastructure services, and associated tooling to meet internal needs and support customer-facing service level agreements.
• Evaluate and choose appropriate software technologies.
• Design and deploy critical infrastructure.
• Contribute with a team that values open and honest communication, collaboration, self-learning and initiative to solve problems big and small.
• Work closely with various teams across Planet, ranging from Satellite and Ground Operations, to Pipeline and Product teams to ensure the satellite constellation meets all of the needs to achieve Planet's missions.

What You Bring:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Aerospace Engineering, or similar.
• 4+ years of relevant work experience.
• Experience building services that leverage cloud-based infrastructure and tooling such as AWS or GCP.
• Experience maintaining infrastructure with Ansible or similar (eg. Kubernetes, Terraform).
• Experience in Python programming.
• Experience with relational database technologies (e.g., Postgres, MySQL, etc.).
• Attention to quality including automated testing, code review, and documentation.
• Experience with maintaining peer-reviewed code and continuous integration and deployment workflows and tooling like GitLab CI and Docker or similar.
• Proficient Linux skills.
• Ability to be a self-starter for solving problems in a dynamic environment.
• Ability to clearly communicate and collaborate with cross-functional teams.

What Makes You Stand Out:

• Experience in API design.
• Experience working with monitoring tools like Datadog, Sentry, or equivalent.
• Experience working in microservice environments.
• Knowledge of aerospace concepts.

Application Deadline:

September 22, 2026 at 11:59p PT 

EAR/ITAR Requirements:

This position requires access to export-controlled information, and as such, employment (or hiring of a contractor) is contingent upon the candidate's ability to access all applicable export-controlled information without additional export licensing being required by the Bureau of Industry and Security and/or the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls.

Benefits While Working at Planet:

These offerings are dependent on employment type and geographical location, based upon applicable law or company policy.

• Comprehensive Medical, Dental, and Vision plans
• Health Savings Account (HSA) with a company contribution
• Generous Paid Time Off in addition to holidays and company-wide days off 
• 16 Weeks of Paid Parental Leave
• Wellness Program and Employee Assistance Program (EAP)
• Home Office Reimbursement
• Monthly Phone and Internet Reimbursement
• Tuition Reimbursement and access to LinkedIn Learning
• Equity
• Commuter Benefits (if local to an office)
• Volunteering Paid Time Off

Compensation:

The US base salary range for this full-time position at the commencement of employment is listed below. Additionally, this role might be eligible for discretionary short-term and long-term incentives (bonus and equity). The final salary range is determined by job related experience, skills and location. The range displays our typical hiring range for new hire salaries in US locations only. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your preferred location during the hiring process.