Rachael Peterson, Principal Hardware Design Engineer, on breaking barriers in engineering

Rachael Peterson, Principal Hardware Design Engineer at Concurrent, shares her journey of breaking barriers in engineering, leading innovation, and lessons for the next generation. Read her story.

"Never be afraid to try something and push yourself to learn something that you haven't done before."

That's Rachael's advice for anyone looking to start a career in engineering. And looking at her career today, it’s advice that has served her well.

Now a Principal Hardware Design Engineer at Concurrent, Rachael has worked on some of the most advanced defence technology in the industry. She’s led the development of our first 3U VPX board with 128GB of memory, TR MAx ; and our most recent product release, Kratos, which has doubled that capacity to 256GB registered DDR5 memory.

But for Rachael, engineering has never been about the big milestones. It’s been about curiosity, learning, and solving complex problems—something that has shaped her career from the very beginning. 

Finding her path in a family of engineers and scientists

"I think it helped growing up in a family that was very technological. My entire family are engineers and scientists—my dad, my brother, all my cousins. It was kind of inevitable, really."

With that foundation, it made sense that Rachael was drawn to science, technology, and maths from an early age. But what really kept her engaged was her curiosity and the challenge of constantly learning.

“I just have this desire to always do something better and be the first to do something really cool.

"I've always found that learning new things is what drives me to keep wanting to do more. That’s been true throughout my career. I’m working on Kratos  at the moment—it’s all brand-new technology. But I’m still looking at other new technologies that I want to do for the next projects and the projects after that.”

From early challenges to big firsts

When Rachael first entered the defence industry, she noticed something right away—technology in the sector wasn’t moving as fast as it could.

"Defence technology was actually quite old hat. It was behind the times compared to other industries, and that was one of the things that drove me—to look for ways to use newer technology."

Early in her career, she had the opportunity to do just that.

"I was the first person that I'm aware of to design a 1-gigahertz PowerPC processor into a military board."

That was a major milestone—and it came just seven or eight years into her career, from an unexpected situation.

"It was effectively the first project I was put on. I was just in a very junior role, and the lead design engineer suddenly left. When the boards came back, they didn’t work very well, and there was nobody else available to fix or redesign them.

"So, I redesigned it all from scratch. And it worked."

It was a defining moment—one that showed her what she was capable of and reinforced the mindset that’s guided her ever since.

Navigating a male-dominated industry

According to census data, women make up only a quarter of STEM roles in the UK, and hardware engineering has traditionally been a largely male environment. Has Rachael ever felt that?

"Yeah, I mean, there have been times when somebody who doesn’t know me has come in and been quite dismissive—like, ‘Oh yeah, she doesn’t know… this is the way to do it.’ And I’m like, OK...

"You’ve just got to stand up for yourself and say, ‘Actually, I do know what I’m doing.’"

Over the years, she’s seen the industry shift and believes things are improving—especially at Concurrent.

"I think women in engineering is becoming more normalised, or certainly to my experience. I mean, it might not be the case everywhere.

“Certainly, in in my career, I've seen women more in software engineering than hardware engineering. But that might be changing now. Certainly, it is at Concurrent: one third of the Design Authority is women.”

Advice to the next generation of female engineers

For young women considering a career in engineering, Rachael’s advice is simple:

"Never be afraid to try something and push yourself to learn something that you haven't done before. And don’t be afraid to fail—because failing is part of learning. If you don't fail, you've probably not tried hard enough."

"If you don’t fail, you’ve probably not tried hard enough.”

She also believes that companies have a role to play in attracting more women into engineering by presenting opportunities in a more inclusive way.

"I’d say just presenting the opportunities in a way that doesn’t make it look like it’s a male-dominated environment. The way things are said, the language used—it could put people off."

Looking ahead

Rachael is already thinking about what’s next. But if she could sit down with her future self, 10 years from now, what would she want to hear?

"Hopefully, future me is telling me that Kratos and the ones after that all worked out!"

With her track record, she probably doesn’t need to worry.

Learn more

Want to see Rachael’s work in action? Explore our just launched Kratos 3U VPX, and TR MDx, the latest innovations in SOSA-aligned 3U VPX, high-performance defence technology.