Senior Electrical Sustaining Engineer

Location: San Francisco, CA

Department: Hardware Engineering

At Ouster, we build sensors and tools for engineers, roboticists, and researchers, so they can make the world safer and more efficient. We've transformed LIDAR from an analog device with thousands of components to an elegant digital device powered by one chip-scale laser array and one CMOS sensor. The result is a full range of high-resolution LIDAR sensors that deliver superior imaging at a dramatically lower price. Our advanced sensor hardware and vision algorithms are used in autonomous cars, drones and many other applications. If you’re motivated by solving big problems, we’re hiring key roles across the company and need your help!

Position Overview

Join Ouster as a Senior Electrical Sustaining Engineer. In this role, you will take ownership of production electrical hardware designs and drive key engineering changes to Ouster’s LiDAR hardware. You will own design revisions to released hardware, whether that’s re-spinning a board around an end-of-life part, qualifying a second source, or adding a cost-down change without disrupting production. This role serves as a key bridge between engineering, supply chain, and quality; you will integrate root-caused hardware issues and translate those insights into design guidelines that prevent repeat defects in next-generation New Product Introduction (NPI) builds.

What you'll do:

Own production hardware designs:

• Take end-to-end technical ownership of electrical designs for shipping lidar sensors, including mixed-signal, power, and laser driver circuitry.
• Make schematic and layout changes for sustaining revisions, then plan and run the design verification needed to release them.
• Drive, review, and approve Engineering Change Orders (ECOs) and Material Change Orders (MCOs, BOM-only changes) in Fusion

Stay ahead of obsolescence:

• Monitor component lifecycles and act on End-of-Life (EOL) notices and Product Change Notifications (PCNs) before they become line-down events.
• Evaluate replacement parts for fit, pinout, and electrical performance, and qualify alternates with suppliers and distributors.
• Keep component libraries accurate, including schematic symbols, footprints, and compliance data (RoHS, REACH, conflict minerals).

Cross-Functional Technical Leadership & Supply Chain

• Act as the subject matter expert for component-level troubleshooting across engineering, quality, test, and tier-1 suppliers.
• Partner with procurement, supply chain, and our contract manufacturer to protect yield, reduce cost, and keep supply continuous.

Field Quality & NPI Feedback Loop

• Serve as the technical point of contact to debug complex failure through root-cause analysis.
• Bridge the gap between field quality and initial design by codifying lessons learned from field bugs into actionable design-for-reliability guidelines for next-generation NPI architectures.

What you'll bring:

• BS in Electrical Engineering or equivalent
• 6+ years in sustaining, component, or electrical design engineering in a volume manufacturing environment.
• Hands-on experience modifying production designs: schematic capture and PCB layout in Altium (or equivalent), circuit simulation (SPICE), and analog/power circuit design.
• Component qualification experience, including reliability testing (thermal cycling, HALT, derating analysis) and standards such as AEC-Q100/Q200.
• Failure analysis skills: fault isolation to component level, and working with FA labs on X-ray, cross-sectioning, and curve tracing.
• Strong bench skills with oscilloscopes, DMMs, power analyzers, and data acquisition systems.
• Experience running ECOs and BOM changes in a PLM system (Arena or similar).
• Python or similar scripting for test automation and data analysis.
• Clear written communication, including validation reports and change documentation.

Nice to have:

• Experience with lidar, optical sensing, or pulsed laser systems (VCSEL emitters, SPAD or photodiode receivers, high-current laser drivers).
• Background in automotive, industrial, or robotics hardware.
• Experience working directly with an offshore contract manufacturer on yield and line issues.
• Exposure to component costing and supplier negotiation.

Personal Attributes:

• Exceptional attention to detail, leadership, and organizational skills.
• Strong analytical and structured problem-solving capabilities.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills for technical documentation and cross-functional teamwork.
• Proactive and self-motivated with the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.