Senior UAS Regulatory Specialist

Mission

As Senior UAS Regulatory Specialist at Rift, you will define and deploy the short, medium and long‑term strategy to obtain, maintain, and extend our SORA based operational authorisations.

You will be the primary point of contact with the DSAC, DGAC and EASA. You will bridge regulation and product design to ensure our systems are compliant from day one, with the technical and human resources needed.

You will also maintain an active watch on international regulatory frameworks, notably the FAA (US), to anticipate regulatory changes and prepare the expansion of our operations beyond France and Europe.

What you will do

Regulatory strategy — You will develop our regulatory roadmap (SORA, MoC, DVR), set authorisation milestones in France and Europe, and prioritise technical developments based on regulatory requirements. Path to SAIL IV — You will build our roadmap to SAIL IV, starting with SAIL III as a key step. Progressive validation of required MoCs, with clear, documented evidence at each stage. You will prepare DVRs with EASA when needed, framing requirements, anticipating blockers, and ensuring technical and regulatory coherence. SORA & authorisations — You will prepare and submit complex operational authorisation applications (SORA/ConOps…) and work closely with the DSAC until approvals are granted. Safety by design — You will work daily with avionics/software/systems teams to translate OSO's into product requirements, feed compliance matrices, and document evidences (safety analyses, tests, logs). Documentation — You will develop and maintain the documentation corpus essential to safety and regulatory compliance (MUE, MANEX, ERP, MoC compliance documentation, various records). Training — You will turn regulatory requirements into clear, actionable internal processes, and organise training sessions to ensure teams readiness. SORA process automation — You will reduce analysis and writing effort by structuring reusable templates and auto‑generation tools. With developers, you will set up systems to pre‑fill recurring sections, especially those related to the concept of operation (e.g., ground environment, overflight areas, density, roads, railways…). Flight tests & demos — You will organise flight tests with the DSAC and EASA to validate our innovative technologies and collect the data needed for regulatory recognition. You will help shape the regulatory landscape by demonstrating solutions beyond conventional approaches. Watch & influence — You will take part in public consultations and working groups, share field feedback, and help shape European regulation in a way that supports our technologies and operating model. Collaboration & QA — You will peer‑review regulatory deliverables, prepare audits, and ensure multi‑country documentation consistency.

Profile

• Senior (≈ 5+ years experience) including 2 years in the drone sector, several complete SORA operational authorisation applications submitted and granted; experience in BVLOS strongly appreciated.

• Strong working knowledge of the SORA methodology and the ability to sustain technical discussions with authorities (DSAC, EASA…). Concrete experience writing and validating MoC's, and leading a DVR end‑to‑end, is a plus.

• Ability to decompose OSOs into product requirements and challenge architecture choices (functional safety, analyses, tests) with engineering teams.

• Excellent writing and communication skills (FR/EN).

• Comfortable in a startup environment: autonomy, prioritisation, fast decision‑making.

Don't worry if your profile doesn't exactly match the description, doesn't mean you're not the right person!

How we work

• We foster a culture of care where anyone can question anyone's ideas

• Boldness is encouraged, we'd rather break the rules than follow them blindly.

• We share both successes and failures openly: learning fast means failing fast.

• Above all, we constantly aim to simplify. No over-engineering. "Best part is no part."