Abaco Systems’ Business – Military and Aerospace
Headquartered in Towcester UK and Huntsville USA, Abaco Systems provides one of the industry’s broadest ranges of high performance, rugged, SWaP-optimized embedded computing platforms. Backed by programs that provide responsive customer support and minimize long term cost of ownership for multi-year programs, Abaco’s solutions are designed to help customers minimize program risk and cost, and to speed time-to-market.
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UK Engineering Graduate Scheme
Schemes offering young graduates an accelerated development plan aligned with competitive salary and career prospects are highly sought after. Abaco recognises this and offers a forward-thinking scheme with the following aims:
- To boost the early career of young engineers by providing them an accelerated development plan
- To incentivise high performing graduates during the scheme
- To encourage talented interns to return to Abaco as graduates
- once they complete their degree
The starting remuneration for a graduate is very competitive in our industry segment. It is reviewed yearly in relation to market value and includes an attractive benefits package (pension, life assurance, medical cover).
Each graduate’s progress is assessed continuously throughout the scheme, and twice-yearly salary reviews take place in line with their performance. An individual graduate development plan is tracked along Abaco’s core business values, and development goals related to the relevant disciplines are established with the manager.
Our graduates can expect to become very rapidly involved in key projects and assigned exciting tasks and responsibilities, working alongside experienced engineers for support and oversight.
A broad set of training courses supports a rapid progression and boosts the graduate’s early career development, across varied topics such as presentation and communication skills, understanding our design processes, setting SMART goals, introductions to project management, financial basics and so on. On top of that, additional specialised training needs are tailored to the specific graduate role within the department.
This more targeted training spans beyond the completion of the graduate scheme and becomes part of the on-going early career development of the engineer. The graduate scheme typically finishes after two years, although completion may be brought forward if individuals demonstrate that they meet or exceed expectations sooner. Interns returning as graduates only remain on the scheme for a maximum of one year.
Graduate Profiles
I graduated from the university of Huddersfield with a 1st class MEng in Electronics Engineering in 2014. I started my graduate career at a small SME, and decided to move to Abaco in 2016 as a graduate ECAD layout engineer. The idea of working on extremely dense and technical PCB designs, and being able to focus so much on my work, was very appealing. As I worked closely with the design engineer for each project, it was easy to learn about the products and learn about the tools, and design practices used. A couple of years in, I shifted over to hardware engineering to work on a very high bandwidth ruggedised switch product in support of a lead hardware engineer; having completed that project, I’m now developing another network switch in conjunction with a team of five to six people.
The impression I have garnered from my time so far working for Abaco is that there is such a huge amount of learning in such a vast array of areas to be had, due to the kinds of products that are developed - drastically more so than any other place I have worked. It’s a very likeable aspect of the job. Also, a secondary result is that there are numerous very competent colleagues to work with, and new technologies that you may never be exposed to outside of the mil-aero industry. For anyone with an interest in electronics and thorough engineering, the Abaco grad scheme and intern schemes provide a great step into a career in embedded electronics engineering.
- Austin Seagers
I graduated last year from The University of Nottingham with a BEng in Mechanical Engineering. I joined the design assurance graduate scheme here at Abaco in 2018, making up a team of three people in total. The opportunity to test state of the art embedded electronics and qualify them to mil/aero industry standards intrigued me and I am enjoying it thoroughly. The variation involved in the job is a particular highlight; a mixture of writing documents, carrying out qualification testing and liaising with external test houses. This consistent variation keeps me on my toes, allows me to maintain a high level of enthusiasm and really lets me get hands-on with the product.
I am still learning and being introduced to new ideas and concepts since joining Abaco; mixing with a variety of engineers from different disciplines all working together on the same project really exposes me to a wider knowledge of engineering fields outside of my own. I have gained a greater understanding of all processes involved throughout an engineering project and the significance of each engineering discipline right the way from design to manufacturing and then qualification testing. The Abaco graduate scheme is a great development path for anyone keen on a career in engineering and interested in embedded electronics in the mil-aero industry.
- Ahmed KenawyYou may like the following products
