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Defense Unicorns Salary

Defense Unicorns Salary

Defense Unicorns pays a median of $164K ($145K–$175K) across 46 public job postings (2025–2026).

💰 $145K–$175K salary range

Median: $164K  ·  Based on 46 public Defense Unicorns job postings  ·  Updated July 1, 2026


This Defense Unicorns salary benchmark is built from public job postings — no private placement data. Figures reflect base salary only (equity is separate) and are refreshed as new postings are collected.

📊 Salary breakdown

Defense Unicorns · pay benchmark · updated July 1, 2026
$164K
inc. eng · sales · ops
All-role median
$145K–$175K
Typical range
$300K view JD
Highest base · Chief Information Security Officer
46
Open roles
~5 yrs
Typical exp.
+25
46 last 90d
New last 30d
ⓘ Base salary only — 63% of roles mention equity · options
IC salary by seniority
Mid
$145K (15)
Senior
$175K (10)
Staff
$175K (7)
Management pay by function
Federal Delivery
$168K (7)
R&D
$157K (2)
Salary by department · median & top base
federal sales
$175K · $201K top (6)
r&d
$173K · $242K top (10)
federal delivery
$145K · $242K top (21)
Highest-paying skills
Segment $168KKubernetes $165KAWS $165KTerraform $165KPulumi $165KGCP $165KAzure $165KHelm $165K

Highest-paying open roles at Defense Unicorns

Defense Unicorns salary by department

  • federal sales: $175K median · $201K top base — Solutions Architect - Pre-Sales (view JD) (6 roles)
  • r&d: $173K median · $242K top base — Senior Engineering Manager (view JD) (10 roles)
  • federal delivery: $145K median · $242K top base — Mission Manager (view JD) (21 roles)

Defense Unicorns salary by seniority

  • Mid: $145K median · $193K top base — Product Designer (view JD) (15)
  • Senior: $175K median · $242K top base — Senior Engineering Manager (view JD) (10)
  • Staff: $175K median · $300K top base — Chief Information Security Officer (view JD) (7)

Defense Unicorns salary — lead & management

  • Manager: $153K median · $242K top base — Mission Manager (view JD) (10)

Defense Unicorns salary by location

  • Remote: $145K median · $300K top base — Chief Information Security Officer (view JD) (28 roles)

Remote work at Defense Unicorns

97% of Defense Unicorns's disclosed-pay roles are remote-friendly.

What Defense Unicorns looks for

Most-required skills across these postings: Kubernetes (27) · AWS (24) · Terraform (22) · Azure (22) · GCP (19) · CI/CD (6) · Python (4) · Docker (4) · Go (2) · Kafka (2).

Benefits & perks at Defense Unicorns

Commonly listed: dental (29) · hsa-fsa (29) · 401k (29) · life-ins (29) · parental (29).

About Defense Unicorns

Defense Unicorns is Series B stage · 101–250 employees · founded 2021 · HQ Colorado Springs, Colorado. This context shapes pay: later-stage, well-funded companies tend to anchor base salary higher.

Experience & background at Defense Unicorns

Roles typically ask for around 5 years of experience (up to 8+ for the most senior).

Posted pay vs. total compensation

The figures on this page are the midpoint of each posting's advertised salary range (which, for commission roles, includes on-target earnings). Equity is a separate — and often large — component of total compensation, especially at high-growth and AI-native companies; 63% of these postings reference equity (options). Equity is not included in the medians above.

Defense Unicorns total compensation signals

Beyond the posted-range midpoint, postings indicate: 17% include commission; common structures: salaried. Bonus, commission, and equity vary by role and are not included in the base medians above.

Defense Unicorns hiring activity

Defense Unicorns has 46 open roles right now, and this benchmark draws on 46 public job postings with disclosed pay. 25 of these roles were first seen in the last 30 days (46 in the last 90). Mostly full-time, with 17 contract roles in the mix.

💼 Similar companies hiring

Compare Defense Unicorns's pay with companies in the same space:

CompanyMedian payvs Defense UnicornsStage
Palantir$150K↓ -8%Public
Baseten$248K↑ +51%Series F
Suno$225K↑ +38%Series D
ClickUp$225K↑ +38%Series C
Runway Ml$250K↑ +53%Series D
BeyondRisk AI-6$128K↓ -22%Seed

💸 Companies that pay more than Defense Unicorns

Console · Vannevar Labs · Lightning AI · Rescale · Anthropic

📚 Salary guides & rankings

Top-Paying Tech Companies for Engineers (2026) · Highest-Paying Cities for Software Engineers · Highest-Paying Engineering Roles

Browse all company salary pages →

Explore more salary data

All Security salaries →  ·  Browse all tech salaries →

Common questions

What does Defense Unicorns pay?
The median pay is $164K, with a typical range of $145K–$175K, based on 46 public job postings (2025–2026). Base only — equity is separate.

What is the highest-paying job at Defense Unicorns?
One of the highest-paying open roles is Chief Information Security Officer, at $260K–$300K base.

Which team pays the most at Defense Unicorns?
The federal sales team, at a $175K median.

Where does this data come from?
Public job postings on company career pages and public job boards — no private placement or client data.

Methodology

Posted-range midpoints (USD) aggregated from 46 public Defense Unicorns job postings (2025–2026). Range = 25th–75th percentile; median = 50th percentile. Roles, departments, skills, and experience are parsed from the postings. Base salary only — equity excluded. Last refreshed July 1, 2026.

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