The posting
ABOUT STANDARD BOTS
Standard Bots builds next-generation robotics for manufacturing affordable, capable, American-made automation. Our hardware is a tightly integrated electromechanical system, and we build it in-house at our Glen Cove, NY facility. The electronics inside our robots, the PCBAs that drive motion, sensing, and control are core IP, and how well they're designed for manufacturing directly determines our yield, our cost, and how fast we can scale.
Role
We're looking for an Electronics Manufacturing Engineer who lives at the intersection of design and production. You'll be the person who makes sure the boards our electrical engineers design can actually be built, reliably, at yield, at cost; whether they run on our in-house SMT line or get handed to a contract manufacturer.
This is a blend of two jobs. On the DFM side, you're the manufacturing conscience in the room during PCB design: reviewing layouts and packages before they're released, catching issues and errors early, and holding the line on the standards that keep boards manufacturable. On the process side, you own the SMT/PCBA process itself — bring-up, process control, yield, and the day-to-day of getting good boards out the door. You're as comfortable marking up a fabrication package as you are standing at the reflow oven diagnosing a solder defect.
The right person is opinionated and constructive. When an EE hands you a design that's going to cause tombstoning, unroutable rework, or a package no CM will accept, you say so early, clearly, and with the fix and you make the standard stick so the same issue doesn't come back.
What you'll own
• DFM review of PCB designs. Review PCBA layouts, footprints, stack-ups, and fabrication/assembly packages before release — including stack-up and controlled-impedance manufacturability. Give clear, specific DFM/DFA and design-for-test (DFT) feedback to electrical engineers; call out issues, errors, and rule violations, and drive them to resolution before the design goes to build.
• DFM automation and checking. Run systematic, rule-based DFM/DFA checks with automated tooling (Valor, CAM350, Allegro DFM, or equivalent) so reviews are consistent and repeatable rather than eyeballed and keep the rule decks current as parts, processes, and vendors change.
• Design for test (DFT). Partner with electrical engineering to build test coverage and access into designs from the start; test points, probe access, and ICT/flying-probe/boundary-scan considerations so boards are testable, not just able to be assembled.
• Manufacturing best practices. Own and uphold the DFM rule set; component spacing, courtyards and keep-outs, panelization, fiducials, thermal relief, testability, and land-pattern standards (IPC-7351 / IPC-2221 / IPC-A-610 class). Keep the standards documented and current, and make sure designs actually conform.
• Package quality and CM readiness. Ensure every output package; Gerbers, fab and assembly drawings, BOM, pick-and-place, and stack-up is complete, unambiguous, and manufacturable by whoever builds it, internal line or external CM. You are the gate a package clears before it's released.
• SMT line and process. Own SMT/PCBA process engineering for the in-house line; stencil and paste, placement, reflow profiling, SPI and AOI, and rework. Drive process control, first-pass yield, and defect reduction; own changeovers and new-board bring-up.
• Board bring-up and test. Bring up, verify, and debug boards on the bench; fluent with oscilloscopes, multimeters, and lab instruments. Run the tests the hardware team specifies, and define test procedures on your own; help stand up automated/functional test (ATE) as we scale production.
• NPI and design-to-production handoff. Partner with electrical engineering through NPI; from first prototype builds to repeatable volume, closing the loop fast between design intent and what's actually buildable on the floor.
• Engineering–production liaison. Be the connective tissue between electrical engineering and the production floor, translating design intent into build- and test-ready instructions and feeding real yield, defect, and test data back to design, keeping the loop between design and the floor tight and open.
• CM partnership. Serve as the manufacturing-engineering interface to external contract manufacturers: qualify processes, resolve DFM findings, review first articles, and hold CMs to our quality bar.
• Continuous improvement. Root-cause solder and assembly defects (8D/5-Whys), cut scrap and rework, and feed lessons learned back into the DFM standards so the next design starts in a better place.
Basic Qualifications:
• Associate's or Bachelor's in Electrical Engineering Technology (EET), Electrical or Manufacturing Engineering, or a related field or equivalent hands-on experience.
• 4+ years in electronics/PCBA manufacturing engineering, with hands-on ownership of an SMT line and its process (paste, placement, reflow, AOI, rework).
• Demonstrated DFM/DFA expertise, reviewed real PCB designs, given feedback to EEs, and can point to boards that shipped better because problems were caught before release.
• Fluency with IPC standards (IPC-A-610, IPC-7351, IPC-2221, J-STD-001) and the vocabulary to hold a design review to them.
• Ability to read and interpret schematics, PCB layouts, fabrication and assembly drawings, BOMs, stack-ups and to spot what's wrong or missing in a release package.
• Hands-on command of the SMT process: reflow profiling, stencil/paste, placement, SPI/AOI, and rework; comfortable diagnosing tombstoning, bridging, voiding, head-in-pillow and similar defects.
• Hands-on with DFM-check tooling (Valor, CAM350, Allegro DFM, or equivalent) and ability to run rule-based checks against layout and fab/assembly data, not just visual reviews.
• Design-for-test (DFT) fluency; design in test coverage and access and review boards for testability (test points, ICT/flying-probe/boundary-scan), not just assembly.
• Hands-on electrical test and measurement; oscilloscopes, multimeters, and bench instruments, able both to run tests defined by the hardware team and to define test procedures.
• Experience preparing and reviewing manufacturing output packages for handoff to internal lines and/or external CMs.
• A constructive, direct communication style; can tell an engineer their design has a problem, make the case, and land the fix without friction.
Preferred Qualifications:
• ECAD fluency (Altium, Cadence/Allegro, KiCad) enough to open a design, inspect footprints and layout and mark it up.
• Experience standing up or scaling an in-house SMT line, or transitioning boards between internal and contract manufacturing.
• CAM/DFM tooling depth (Valor, CAM350, Allegro DFM) and experience building or maintaining automated DFM rule decks.
• Automated/functional test (ATE) experience; National Instruments/LabVIEW, Pico Technology, or equivalent.
• Robotics, automotive, aerospace, medical, or other precision/high-reliability electronics backgrounds.
• Lean/Six Sigma and SPC on an SMT line.
• Familiarity with ERP/MES and PLM systems.
Why this role
You'll own the seam between how our electronics are designed and how they're actually built — the place where yield, cost, and scale are won or lost. You'll have real authority to set the DFM standard, the tools to enforce it, and a design team that needs your feedback to ship. If you like being the person who makes hard boards manufacturable and hates seeing preventable defects reach the line, this is your seat.
COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS
The salary range for this role is $110,000 to $145,000. We are open to a variety of seniority levels for this role and will build compensation packages that are commensurate with seniority and skill level. Base salary is just one part of the overall compensation at Standard Bots. All Full-Time Employees are eligible for Employee Stock Options. We also offer a package of benefits including paid time off, medical/dental/vision insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, and 401(k) to regular full-time employees.
