Staff Mechanical Engineer, Instrument Operations

At Element Biosciences, we are passionate about our mission to empower the scientific community with more freedom and flexibility to accelerate our collective impact on humanity. We have built a highly efficient product-driven organization where employees can learn, grow, and thrive in a challenging but encouraging environment. We are committed to scientific integrity, collegiality, honesty, objectivity, and openness.

 We are seeking an experienced Staff Mechanical Engineer, Instrument, Operations who will play a pivotal role supporting the ongoing manufacturing of our cutting-edge DNA sequencing instruments. This is an incredible opportunity for someone who is passionate about operations and high performance electronics for scientific instrument. We are looking for candidates with a solid background in CNC, sheet metal, and injection molding design and manufacturing, electromechanical system troubleshooting, and capital equipment manufacturing. This role will report to Engineering Manager, Instrument Operations and will be a San Diego based role.

If you possess the following and want to make a meaningful impact, we invite you to explore this role.

Essential Functions and Responsibilities:

• Team Leadership: Subject Matter Expert on Mechanical Engineering for Instrument Operations Team. Provide training and guidance to staff on mechanical engineering and robust design control
• Sustaining Engineering: Update mechanical design for various components. Manage and perform change control from concept to cut-over for on market product. Drive improvement efforts to optimize instrument performance, lifetime, reliability, and robustness against external forces
• Root Cause Analysis: Investigate and address manufacturing issues through root cause analysis, implementing corrective actions to prevent recurrence. Comfortable debugging system level issues on electro-mechanical systems
• Sourcing: Support qualification of new suppliers for components made via machining, sheet metal fabrication, and injection molding
• Quality Assurance: Work closely with Quality Control and Assurance teams to establish and maintain rigorous quality standards throughout the manufacturing process
• Documentation: Create and maintain comprehensive manufacturing documentation, including SOPs, work instructions, and process flowcharts

Education and Qualification:

• Minimum BS degree in Mechanical Engineering and eight (8) or more years relevant work experience (or equivalent combination of education and industry experience)
• Demonstrated problem-solving experience with a focus on root cause analysis and debugging electromechanical systems required
• Strong theoretical and applied understanding of mechanical design fundamentals including material selection, free-body diagrams, thermal gradients, and tolerance stack-ups
• 3+ years experience working on capital equipment preferred
• Expertise modeling in SolidWorks required. Experience designing components and assembly fixtures
• Familiarity with quality management systems and regulatory requirements (ISO 13485, FDA regulations) preferred
• Ability to apply GD&T to drawings and communicate expectations with team members
• Forward thinking and tactical. Able to influence via planning and collaboration skills
• Proactive self-starter who drives action, investigations, and delivers results without task-level structured guidance
• Ability to work in a fast paced, interdisciplinary environment and quickly adjust to rapidly evolving technology and priorities
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, capable of clearly explaining technical issues, ideas, and project status to peers and management

Physical Requirements:

• Must be able to lift 15 pounds

Location:

• San Diego, CA – on-site

Travel:

• Up to 10% domestically

Base Compensation Pay Range:

• $125,000 - $165,000

In addition to base compensation, you will be eligible for stock options, discretionary annual bonus, no cost health insurance plans, 401k with company match, and flexible paid time off. 

Please Note: Base compensation will depend on multiple factors, including geographic location, qualifications, and experience. 

We foster an environment such that all people are afforded the freedom to pursue their passions without regard to race, color, religion, national or ethnic origin, gender (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, veteran status or any other characteristics protected by law.