Director of Engineering

Role: Director of Engineering - Platform | eVTOL Aerospace Location: Dubai - Tax-Free Working Arrangement: Office based Salary: Salary details available on application Most senior engineering roles are about maintaining something someone else built. This one isn't. We've just come off a briefing with the leadership team of one of the most ambitious aerospace programmes in the world right now, and we need to talk to you. Because if your career has been building towards a moment where you get to stand something up from scratch - a genuinely novel aircraft, a founding team of world-class domain engineers, a programme with the kind of commercial backbone that most ventures can only dream about - this might be it. What is it? A Director of Engineering - Platform role on a confidential eVTOL programme based in Dubai South. The aircraft is a next-generation electric platform designed to deliver life-saving emergency response capability. Novel configuration. Genuinely unsolved engineering problems. And a mission that, unlike a significant chunk of what the aerospace industry produces, is unambiguously good for the world. The company is both OEM and operator - they will certify the aircraft and operate a fleet at scale. That combination essentially doesn't exist anywhere else in the industry today. And they're doing it under a 20-year sovereign customer agreement, which gives this programme the kind of forward visibility that venture-backed eVTOL companies simply cannot offer. What does the role involve? You will own engineering operations for the Platform stream. That means building the team, running the technical maturity cadence, managing the gate review rhythm, allocating resources across the domain Chief Engineers, and keeping the programme moving from early architecture through to certification and production. You sit alongside the Chief Engineer - Platform as an equal counterpart, and you report directly to the CTO. This is not a technical design role. It is a programme execution and people leadership role. The CE decides what gets built. You make sure it gets built. Who are we looking for? Someone who has led teams of serious engineers - Chief Engineers or equivalent - on certified civil aerospace programmes. Someone who has built an engineering organisation in the early stages of a complex programme, not just joined one that was already running. Someone who is comfortable with greenfield ambiguity and thrives in it rather than tolerating it. If you have spent your career in mature OEM programmes with hundreds of engineers and a decades-old process framework, this will feel different. That's not a warning - it's a filter. The people who've already joined this programme left very senior roles at very large companies to do it. They did it because the scale of the challenge and the quality of the mission was worth it. The package Tax-free in Dubai. Relocation package included. Senior leadership level. Salary details available on application. A note on the location Dubai South is adjacent to Al Maktoum International Airport - one of the most significant aviation infrastructure developments in the world. If you have always wanted to be somewhere that takes aerospace seriously, this is it. If this sounds like the kind of opportunity you've been waiting for, apply now or reach out directly. We screen every applicant personally - no AI filters. We welcome diverse applicants and are dedicated to treating all applicants with dignity and respect, regardless of background. Show more Show less

Own engineering operations for the Platform stream: build the team, run the technical maturity cadence, manage the gate review rhythm, allocate resources across domain Chief Engineers, and keep the programme moving from early architecture through to certification and production. Work alongside the Chief Engineer - Platform as an equal counterpart and report directly to the CTO. This is a programme execution and people leadership role, not a technical design role. The Chief Engineer decides what gets built; you ensure it gets built.