{"id":46477,"date":"2026-07-29T17:39:27","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T09:39:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/seattle-tech-week-highlights-how-unorthodox-routes-can-lead-to-careers-on-the-space-frontier\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T17:39:27","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T09:39:27","slug":"seattle-tech-week-highlights-how-unorthodox-routes-can-lead-to-careers-on-the-space-frontier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/seattle-tech-week-highlights-how-unorthodox-routes-can-lead-to-careers-on-the-space-frontier\/","title":{"rendered":"Seattle Tech Week highlights how unorthodox routes can lead to careers on the space frontier"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" loading=\"eager\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1260\" height=\"1013\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek2-1260x1013.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-941081\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek2-1260x1013.jpeg 1260w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek2-768x617.jpeg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek2-1536x1234.jpeg 1536w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek2-2048x1646.jpeg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1260px) 100vw, 1260px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" class=\"wp-element-caption\">Joydeep Hazra, program director for electric vehicles at South Seattle College, holds up a prototype Mars rover during a Seattle Tech Week session. He\u2019s surrounded by, from left, Alec Courtright, technical program manager at EarthDaily Federal, Anjali Roychowdhury, lead software engineer at SpaceX; Kayla VanderPutten, technical recruiter at Anduril Industries; and moderator Amy Miller, head of people and talent at Portal Space Systems. (GeekWire Photo \/ Alan Boyle)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The road to space isn\u2019t always a straight line. Sometimes, the itinerary for a career in the space industry begins with years of experience in other tech fields. And sometimes, it starts at an espresso stand.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI actually started as a barista at SpaceX, and I somehow got recruited to go build Starlink satellites,\u201d Kayla VanderPutten, a technical recruiter at Anduril Industries, said Monday at a downtown Seattle Tech Week session focusing on the intersection of space and technology. \u201cI don\u2019t know why they let me do that, but I was there for the first 500 satellites before I transitioned into recruiting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Over the course of 25 years, Joydeep Hazra\u2019s career path took him through a series of jobs in telecommunications and network engineering, including management positions at Nokia, Mavenir and TRIDENTX. Now he\u2019s the manager of a federally funded program focusing on electric vehicles at South Seattle College \u2014 and he\u2019s getting involved in aerospace as well.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Last week, South Seattle College and the nonprofit Mars Society announced a partnership to build a space research station on campus, complete with a habitat that can be used for simulating missions on the moon or Mars.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The electric vehicle program could help students prepare for careers building Mars rovers, like the Chinese-built prototype rover that Hazra displayed during the Seattle Tech Week session. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Other technical fields could provide further opportunities for space-centric crossovers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhen you\u2019re building a lunar habitat, there are a lot more things to do than just going up and down in the rocket, and that\u2019s where all of us count,\u201d Hazra said. \u201cInteroperability, frequencies, microgrids, plumbing, psychology, cooking \u2014 everything is going to be super-important, because without that, the lunar habitat would only have robots from China, and not our astronauts.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><!-- Related story module | Links to: Mars Society and South Seattle College team up on space habitat | https:\/\/www.geekwire.com\/2026\/mars-society-and-south-seattle-college-simulated-space-habitat\/ --><\/p>\n<p>  Related<br \/>\n  <img loading=\"lazy\" height=\"758\" width=\"1200\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260721-marssoc.jpg\" alt=\"\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;display:block;border-radius:4px;\"><br \/>\n  Mars Society and South Seattle College team up on space habitat<\/p>\n<style>\n  @media (max-width: 600px) {\n    aside.callout { float:none !important; max-width:100% !important; margin-left:0 !important; margin-right:0 !important; }\n    aside.callout .callout-img { display:none !important; }\n  }\n<\/style>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">South Seattle College isn\u2019t the only Seattle-area school expanding into the final frontier: Two years ago, Amazon Leo (formerly known as Project Kuiper) partnered with Lake Washington Institute of Technology in Kirkland to launch a certification program for satellite technicians. Amazon also offers a Career Choice program that gives non-technical employees, such as workers in fulfillment centers, the opportunity to train for satellite manufacturing jobs. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">VanderPutten\u2019s career followed a less formal path. While she made coffee for the engineers at SpaceX, she also made conversation about the satellites they were building \u2014 and eventually jumped at the opportunity to join them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhen you\u2019re trying to build 10 satellites a day, it has to be really, really easy to do,\u201d she said. \u201cOnce I moved onto the floor, the engineers really wanted my feedback, and I really enjoyed that. I don\u2019t know if they always enjoyed my feedback, because it sometimes created more work for them. But that was probably the biggest surprise \u2014 being brand new and having these really talented engineers want my feedback, and want to help improve their designs based on what I was seeing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">From there, she transitioned into recruiting for tech ventures. In June, she started a new job at Anduril, a defense tech company that\u2019s rapidly expanding in Seattle. So, as a recruiter, what would she tell someone who\u2019s not highly technical but is interested in the space industry?<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI would tell new grads and people who are junior in their careers to be curious, to learn how everything works together, and to ask questions,\u201d she said. \u201cYou might feel that your question is silly or dumb, and you don\u2019t want to embarrass yourself. But I can guarantee you that someone else in that room is going to have that question, and now you can go on and help other people.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1260\" height=\"1023\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek1-1260x1023.jpg\" alt=\"Seattle Tech Week panelists laughing at a wry comment\" class=\"wp-image-941078\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek1-1260x1023.jpg 1260w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek1-768x623.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek1-1536x1247.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/260728-techweek1-2048x1662.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1260px) 100vw, 1260px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" class=\"wp-element-caption\">Another Seattle Tech Week panel focused on the impacts that space technology has on society and the economy. Here, a comment from Joseph Gnanapragasam, director of investment banking at BofA Securities, draws laughs from Ginger Florea, a former intelligence official; Portal Space Systems CEO Jeff Thornburg; and KIRO 7 meteorologist Nick Allard, the panel moderator. (GeekWire Photo \/ Alan Boyle) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Joydeep Hazra, program director for electric vehicles at South Seattle College, holds up a prototype Mars rover during a Seattle Tech Week session. He\u2019s surrounded by, from left, Alec Courtright, technical program manager at EarthDaily Federal, Anjali Roychowdhury, lead software engineer at SpaceX; Kayla VanderPutten, technical recruiter at Anduril Industries; and moderator Amy Miller, head [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9906,1873,4431],"class_list":["post-46477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-careers","tag-education","tag-seattle-tech-week"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46477"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46477\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}