IT Support Engineer
Location: Onsite — Austin, TX
Employment Type: Direct Hire, Full-Time
Job Title: IT Support Engineer
About 9 Mothers
The modern battlefield has changed. Cheap, autonomous suicide drones have turned the tactical advantage upside down, and the world is looking for a solution. At 9 Mothers, we aren’t just "innovating"—we are building the shield.
Backed by top-tier investors, we develop AI powered machines designed to intercept and neutralize Group 1/sUAS threats in real-time. Our flagship product is a low-power, counter-drone system built for the edge—on vehicles, at bases, or in a soldier's pack.
Why 9 Mothers?
While others build for "awareness" or "long-term research," we build for the immediate survival of those in harm’s way. We are a team of hackers, engineers, and mission-driven builders who value field-ready capability over polished slide decks. If you want to see your code or hardware in the field next month—not next year—this is your playground.
Position Summary
As an IT Support Engineer at 9 Mothers, you will serve as the technical backbone of our rapidly growing defense engineering team. We are looking for someone who takes full ownership of our infrastructure, identity systems, and endpoint management. You will build durable configurations, leverage aggressive AI automation, and directly safeguard our mission-critical operations and compliance standards in our Austin lab and remote field deployments.
Essential Duties
- IT Systems: Spend your first week getting up to speed on our infra and compliance requirements, exploring our environments, and getting hands-on with the EDDA platform.
- IAM: Entra ID commercial and GCC High tenants: user accounts, groups, licensing, and provisioning.
- Support & Operations: Day-to-day support for a small team of engineers — triage by business impact, communicate ETAs, and close the loop. Keep our AI agents and monitoring stack (Grafana / Loki / Prometheus) fed and honest. Keep CMMC controls compliant and aligned with the SSP.
- Build: Use AI tooling aggressively — and own the verification: pilot ring before fleet-wide, read what the script touches, and keep rollbacks in hand. There is no ticketing system yet; you’ll pick and stand up the lightweight tooling you want to live in.
- Grow into Field Support: Expect occasional travel to support remote deployments. Establish remote management tooling and build durable configurations that survive without you on-site.
Requirements
- 1–4 years in an IT administration / systems admin / DevOps / InfoSec / "desktop engineering" role. Titles don't matter; scope does.
- CRITICAL (Hard Requirement): Hands-on keyboard MDM experience managing Macs. Jamf or Intune experience is a strict requirement.
- You've been responsible for a fleet of Macs. You have used Apple Business Manager (ABM) for Automated Device Enrollment (ADE). You leverage Declarative Device Management (DDM) wherever possible, your MDM configs are version controlled, and your deployment workflow resembles CI (bonus points if agents run it all for you). If you use Intune's web interface, be prepared to explain why.
- Comfortable in a shell. Solid networking fundamentals (VLANs, DHCP/DNS, Wi-Fi, 802.1X), with exposure to PKI being a plus. Prepare to know FIPS requirements intimately.
- Calm, clear communication with frustrated people under pressure. You are an orchestrator who takes ownership, cares, and takes pride in your work. Mentally and emotionally prepared to work at a fast-paced defense startup.
- Must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident, or protected individual under 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3) — required for access to export-controlled information (ITAR/EAR).
- Clear background check and pre-access screening required before any system access.
Nice-to-Have
- Azure GCC High Tenant or other sovereign-cloud experience.
- CMMC / NIST 800-171 exposure: asset inventory, change control, and evidence discipline.
- Network Admin experience: installing APs and cameras, configuring firewalls, IDS, and VLAN management (Cisco/UniFi/OpenWrt exposure).
- PKI in practice: SCEP, EAP-TLS, certificate lifecycles.
- Observability experience with Grafana / Loki / Prometheus.
- Customer service focus: You enjoy helping people, want to be the smiling face of IT, and are excited to build and manage the future platform support team.
Benefits
- Meaningful Early Equity: You aren't just an employee; you are a foundational owner. Your contributions directly drive the value of your stake in the company.
- Direct Roadmap Influence: Forget the bureaucracy of big defense. You will have a seat at the table, directly shaping our product and technology trajectory from day one.
- Mission-Critical Work: We don't build for "what if." We build systems the Department of War actively needs to counter immediate, real-world threats.
- The Builder's Playground: Work in a brand-new lab fully optimized for rapid prototyping, equipped with NVIDIA Jetsons, high-end scopes, and 3-D printers.
- 100% Employer-Paid Premiums: We cover 100% of your medical, dental, and vision insurance premiums and cover 50% of healthcare premiums for your dependents.
- Unlimited PTO: We value results, not clock-watching. Take the time you need to stay sharp and recharge.
- Zero Red Tape: You have the autonomy to make technical decisions that would take months of committee approval at a larger firm.
- Austin-Based Culture: Join an onsite team in Austin, TX, where we prioritize high-bandwidth collaboration and rapid field-testing.
- Relocation Assistance: We want the best talent in the room. If you aren't in Austin yet, we’ll help you get here, to make your transition to the Silicon Hills seamless.
About the Interview
- Initial screen with recruiter (30 min phone call)
- Virtual interview with Director of Security (30 min via MS Teams)
- Onsite interview in Austin, TX