Hadrian is hiring Forward Deployed Directors at $300K–$415K after a $1.37B Series D

Hadrian, which builds AI-driven autonomous factories for aerospace and defense, is hiring Senior Directors and Directors of Forward Deployed Engineering in Los Angeles at $300,000–$415,000 plus equity. The postings sit alongside an all-levels Forward Deployed Engineer opening at $140,000–$300,000. The company cites a $1.37 billion Series D at a $7.87 billion valuation as it expands manufacturing capacity and its Factory-as-a-Service platform.

Hadrian embeds Forward Deployed teams on its largest programs with the U.S. Government, the Armed Forces, and major defense primes. The teams work with Program from scoping through execution: they extend Opus, Hadrian’s manufacturing autonomy platform, or take new products from zero to one when a program needs them, then feed what they learn back to platform teams. Recent work includes standing up Factories-as-a-Service for the Armed Forces and primes, extending Opus into domains such as energetics, and turning a single-program product into a billion-dollar-plus product line.

Directors own the technical roadmap for one or more programs, the executive relationship on the technical side, and hiring for the engineers, product managers, and designers on their program. The postings ask for commercial technical leaders who have scaled products from zero to one, owned senior customer commitments, and stay hands-on enough to build a v0 early or review what the team ships later. ITAR eligibility is required.

Why it matters for FDEs: Hadrian is treating Forward Deployed Engineering as the tip of multi-billion-dollar manufacturing programs, not a side consulting bench. Leadership seats that hire and grow FDE pods, with pay in the $300K–$415K band, are a clear signal that defense and industrial AI companies are building durable FDE orgs after large funding rounds.