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Resume · Sheet 04

Mike Martin

Lead RF Systems Engineer · Denver, CO

RF systems engineer with technical leadership in space and defense: system-level architecture, RF front-end design, link budgets and business development. I lead customer-facing architecture trades and proposals, and I scale engineering through automation — increasingly by building the tools myself with AI agents.

60 → 1min

review time with a web tool I built

1,500hrs

engineering time saved

1:16

distribution network, 35 dB gain at 40 A

7+yrs

RF hardware for space and defense

Fig. 1 · Career, to scale

01Engineering experience

  1. Jan 2024 – Present

    Longmont, CO

    Lead RF Design / Systems Engineer

    Redwire SpaceCurrent

    • Lead engineer for R-GPS: technical discussions, architecture trades and link budget development.
    • Own RF architecture for high-stakes proposals and represent the company as the technical authority.
    • Built a web-based data-processing tool that cut review time from 60 minutes to 1, saving about 1,500 hours.
    • Institutionalized standardized design reviews and "test like you fly" protocols, reducing non-conformances and improving test repeatability.
    • Designed and managed L/S-band RF front ends from simulation through procurement and flight test.
    • Directed CapEx lab outfitting and explored supplier financing models to modernize lab capability.
  2. May 2023 – Jan 2024

    Boulder, CO

    Senior RF Engineer

    Lockheed Martin

    • Led a trade study on RF-over-fiber for ground-to-satellite links: gathered cross-functional requirements and evaluated architectures.
    • Defined link budgets and system specs; coordinated vendor technical inputs for RFQ packages.
    • Designed S-band communications hardware, balancing RF, mechanical and system constraints.
    • Captured schematics in Mentor Graphics to electrical and interface standards.
  3. Jun 2021 – Apr 2023

    Westminster, CO

    RF Design Engineer II

    Ball Aerospace

    • Designed the RF front end for a high-frequency system spanning L, S and C bands.
    • Directed two engineers on schematic, layout and fabrication of test hardware.
    • Wrote STM32 AGC control firmware over I²C, SPI and UART.
    • Built bare-metal firmware for a phased-array T/R switch board with high-speed control logic.
  4. Jan 2019 – Jun 2021

    Westminster, CO

    RF Design Engineer I

    Ball Aerospace

    • Designed and tested custom RF boards for digital beamforming.
    • Simulated link performance in Microwave Office, HFSS and QUCS; analyzed results in MATLAB.
    • Developed a Ku-band RF distribution board with connector and via optimizations.
    • Verified a 1:16 gain distribution network: 35 dB gain, 40 A power delivery.
    • Led design of passive and active RF boards for a ground-based phased-array demonstrator.
    • Automated RF testing with SCPI scripting and lab instrumentation.
  5. May 2017 – Aug 2018

    Plano, TX

    Electrical Engineer

    L3 Mustang Technology

    • Design verification on five DC/DC converters (buck, boost, buck-boost) for defense systems.
    • Helped design and test magnetometer-based ICs, optimizing gain, bias and noise.
    • Built a MATLAB/Simulink solution using a 9-axis sensor to automate radar test alignment.
    • Wrote and ran test plans for drone-related defense hardware.
    • Offered a continued role beyond the internship.

02Before engineering

May 2010 – Nov 2014 · Austin, TX · London, UK

Senior Supply Chain Analyst

Apple

  • Operations and finance roles supporting high-volume product delivery.
  • Inventory planning and cross-functional process improvement.

Jan 2006 – May 2010 · Tucson, AZ · Dallas, TX

Global Business Planner

Texas Instruments

  • Led production planning and operations for a $225M product line.
  • Data-driven decisions with a focus on customer alignment.

Nearly nine years in planning and supply chain is why I size trades in dollars and schedule as well as dB.

03Skills

RF systems

RF system & architecture designLink budgetsFront-end designPhased arraysTrade studiesTechnical proposals

Simulation

HFSSMicrowave OfficeADSopenEMS (FDTD)QUCSMATLAB / Simulink

Hardware

Schematic capturePCB designAltium DesignerKiCadMentor GraphicsMains & power design

Embedded

STM32ESP32-S3Bare-metal firmwareI²C · SPI · UART

Test & measurement

Network analyzersSpectrum / signal analyzersPower metersSCPI automationTest planning

Software & AI

Claude Code / agentic developmentPython · FastAPITypeScript · ReactPostgresDocker · ProxmoxLLM apps (vision, voice, RAG)

04Education

M.S. Electrical Engineering

The University of Texas at Dallas

2015 – 2018

MBA, Marketing / IT & Operations Management

SMU Cox School of Business

2008 – 2010

B.S. Business Administration, Finance & Operations

University of Arizona

2001 – 2005

Outside the day job

I also ship software and hardware, built with AI agents.

RF test benches, a 4-zone mains fermentation controller, a vision-and-voice wine cellar app, a SaaS invoicing product. Each one designed, reviewed and shipped with Claude Code.