Manufacturing Engineer

Manufacturing Engineer | Manufacturing & Production
Location: Hayward, CA (on‑site)

About 1X
We’re an AI and robotics company based in Palo Alto, California, on a mission to build a truly abundant society through general‑purpose robots capable of performing any kind of work autonomously.

We believe that to truly understand the world and grow in intelligence, humanoid robots must live and learn alongside us. That’s why we’re focused on developing friendly home robots designed to integrate seamlessly into everyday life.

We’re looking for curious, driven, and passionate people who want to help shape the future of robotics and AI. If this mission excites you, we’d be thrilled to hear from you and explore how you might contribute to our journey.

Role Overview
As a Manufacturing Engineer at 1X, you will be a hands‑on technical leader responsible for taking components and assemblies for humanoid robots from prototype stage through volume production. You will design, optimize, and steward manufacturing processes to make them precise, repeatable, cost‑effective, and reliable under real‑world use.

Responsibilities

• Develop and refine manufacturing processes for robotic mobility and control components such as actuators, drive units, precision components, motor housings, and skeletal structures

• Oversee full manufacturing workflows including fixture design, CAM programming, selection of cutting tools, and inspection/validation methods

• Deploy automation and lights‑out machining strategies to enable continuous production with minimal human intervention

• Drive process improvements to reduce cycle time, increase first‑pass yield, and improve reliability of robot hardware

• Collaborate with design engineering on part geometry, materials, and design changes to ensure manufacturability at every stage

• Manage change releases and product design revisions into production, focusing on scalability and consistency

• Act as technical liaison between design, machining, assembly, and quality teams for owned components

• Support build technicians and operators, maintain work instructions and operating procedures in up‑to‑date state

• Implement statistical process control (SPC) and quality monitoring practices, take ownership of part or part family quality metrics

• Troubleshoot production issues such as tolerance stack‑ups, tool wear, misalignment, and assembly variability

• Design efficient factory layouts, workflows, and test or subassembly stations optimized for speed and flexibility

• Participate in new product introduction (NPI), managing prototype, validation units, and ramp‑up phases of production