Directed-energy defense platform built on FPGA and power-management firmware
Epirus manufactures Leonidas, a software-defined high-power microwave platform for counter-UAS and counter-swarm defense. The tech stack—Xilinx FPGAs, HDL (Verilog/VHDL), MATLAB/Simulink, SPICE, HFSS—reflects deep embedded systems and RF engineering. Hiring velocity is accelerating with 16 roles posted in the last 30 days, heavily weighted toward senior engineers and manufacturing roles, while pain points center on production scaling (new PCB line, capacity planning, AS9100D compliance, fault diagnosis) rather than product R&D—signaling a transition from prototype to production.
Notable leadership hires: Manufacturing Director
Epirus is a defense-technology company founded in 2018 and headquartered in Torrance, California. The company designs and manufactures Leonidas, a directed-energy platform that uses intelligent power management to deliver high-power microwave effects for counter-unmanned systems and counter-swarm scenarios. The product is software-defined, allowing flexible deployment across multiple platforms. Operations span embedded firmware development, RF/microwave design, mechanical and PCB manufacturing, supply-chain logistics, and field support for deployed systems. The 201–500-person organization is engineering-forward, with active investments in production capacity, compliance infrastructure, and supply-chain optimization.
Core stack: Xilinx and Intel FPGAs (Vivado, Quartus), HDL (Verilog, VHDL), MATLAB/Simulink, ARM, embedded Linux, C/C++/Python. RF/EM simulation: SPICE, HFSS. Manufacturing: Solidworks, Solidworks PDM, Oracle Fusion. Project/ops: Jira, Microsoft Project, Smartsheet, Apache Airflow, Docker, Kubernetes.
Core product: Leonidas microwave platform development and deployment. Active projects include scaling production (new PCB line, capacity planning), assembly process automation, hardware library standardization, phased-array component design, and ERP system optimization for high-mix manufacturing.
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