Sunnyvale, CA · MMXXVI
Stephan Claxton
Most high-consequence software is built without a system. I work on the engineering discipline that fixes that, across autonomy, space, and defense.
Today: systems engineering for autonomy at Applied Intuition. Before: MBSE for space and defense programs at Lockheed Martin, then technical program management at Strategic Technology Consulting (Arcfield).
Field notes
- Structure produces behavior. The architecture of a system is its actual design. Change the architecture and you change what the system does. Change anything else, and you mostly change the story you tell about it.
- Building autonomy is the hardest verification problem in engineering today, and the one rewriting how systems engineering is practiced.
- Requirements traceability is institutional memory. It feels useful exactly once, on the worst day. That is enough.
- The aerospace tradition gave systems engineering its methods. AI and autonomy are giving it back its relevance, and making executable models the new default.
Writing
- What satellite systems engineering taught me about building autonomous vehicles
Two domains that look nothing alike on the surface, and the MBSE discipline that translates between them.
Experience
Systems Engineer
Applied IntuitionSystems architecture & verification for autonomous vehicle development
Sr. Principal Systems Engineer · TPM
Strategic Technology Consulting (Arcfield)Senior systems engineering and technical program management on defense programs
Sr. Systems Engineer
Lockheed MartinModel-based systems engineering for space & defense programs. SysML modeling, requirements architecture, MBSE practice.