Senior Robotics Solutions Engineer

Job description

**This position is listed on behalf of a partner company, who manages all applications and next steps. Our partner is looking for a Senior Robotics Solutions Engineer based in the United States.** This role leads the integration of industrial robotics with an enterprise physical logistics platform, taking AI-driven perception from the digital environment into real-world machine action. You will work directly with enterprise distribution centers to understand existing automation cells, identify constraints, and design reliable robotics integrations. The position combines field engineering, robot control, industrial safety, software development, systems integration, and customer-facing technical leadership. You will own solutions from onsite discovery and architecture through implementation, commissioning, testing, and operational handoff. The initial focus is on high-volume palletizing and pallet sorting, with opportunities to expand into auditing, pick-and-pack validation, and material handling applications. Between customer visits, you will build reusable platform capabilities, integration services, operator interfaces, and tooling that can scale beyond individual customer deployments. This is a high-autonomy environment for an engineer who can move comfortably between a distribution floor, industrial controls, production software, and executive-level customer conversations. ### Accountabilities: - Lead technical discovery at enterprise customer sites, establishing a detailed baseline of automation cells, including robot models, controllers, firmware, I/O maps, safety architecture, cameras, sensors, cycle times, throughput, and physical constraints. - Investigate undocumented or poorly documented systems by asking precise questions, validating assumptions, and working directly with operators, maintenance teams, industrial engineers, IT leaders, and other stakeholders. - Design, build, integrate, and commission control and motion logic for industrial palletizing and sortation applications. - Develop motion sequences covering pick-and-place operations, stacking, pallet patterns, singulation, depalletizing, and recovery from partial or failed cycles. - Take ownership of existing production systems and improve their reliability, behavior, and maintainability where required. - Own the functional safety approach for deployed robotic systems, including risk assessments, safeguarding, emergency stops, interlocks, safe-speed and separation considerations, and required safety documentation. - Design and implement control and telemetry interfaces between the platform and robot controllers, PLCs, fleet managers, conveyors, and sortation systems. - Work with technologies and protocols such as **ROS 2, vendor SDKs, controller APIs, HTTPS/REST, MQTT, OPC UA, and industrial fieldbus systems** as appropriate to each deployment. - Translate computer vision classification and inspection outputs into safe, timely, and reliable machine actions, including appropriate handling of uncertain, incomplete, or incorrect model predictions. - Design robust failure handling for real-world operating conditions, including dropped connections, partial task completion, inconsistent telemetry, and discrepancies between reported system state and physical machine state. - Build functional operator-facing interfaces that visualize robot-driven work in progress and surface exceptions that require human intervention. - Develop documentation, test coverage, deployment procedures, and internal training materials so customer solutions become durable and reusable engineering capabilities rather than one-off implementations. - Collaborate with product, AI, engineering, and customer-facing teams to determine which capabilities should become reusable platform features and which requirements are appropriately customer-specific. - Communicate technical constraints, project risks, scope limitations, and delivery trade-offs clearly to both internal leadership and customer stakeholders. - Support enterprise deployments with a strong understanding of customer operations, shift patterns, production priorities, throughput requirements, and the operational cost of downtime. ### Requirements - **3-month contract** for a senior, customer-facing robotics engineering role. - **5+ years of relevant robotics, controls, software, or systems engineering experience** is strongly aligned with the scope of the position. - Proven production experience programming and commissioning **industrial robotic arms**, with experience using platforms such as **Yaskawa Motoman, Fanuc, ABB, KUKA, or Universal Robots**. Coursework and hobby-only robotics experience is not sufficient. - Strong understanding of robot motion, including kinematics, coordinate frames, tool center points, path planning, singularities, payload and reach limitations, collision avoidance, and palletizing/depalettizing pattern logic. - Hands-on experience using industrial robot teach pendants and diagnosing differences between programmed behavior and actual production-cell behavior. - Practical functional safety knowledge, including **ISO 10218**, **ISO/TS 15066** where collaborative operation applies, risk assessment methodology, safety-rated monitored stops, category and performance-level concepts, and safety PLCs. - Strong controls integration experience involving PLCs, industrial protocols, sensors, conveyors, sortation systems, and the electrical realities of production automation cells. - Production experience with **ROS or ROS 2**, combined with the judgment to determine when a robotics framework is or is not appropriate for an industrial application. - Strong programming ability in **Python and C++** for robotics and control applications. - Experience building production services using **TypeScript, Node.js, Go, or Python**, with strong understanding of event-driven integration patterns. - Familiarity with **REST, gRPC, MQTT, and WebSockets** and the ability to integrate distributed software systems with physical automation. - Ability to build a functional operator interface using **React or a similar front-end framework** when required. - Comfortable working alongside computer vision systems and reasoning about latency, confidence thresholds, false positives, uncertainty, and the consequences of perception errors for physical machines. - Strong customer-facing communication skills, with the ability to discuss throughput, cost, and operational outcomes with distribution leaders while also troubleshooting detailed mechanical, controls, or maintenance issues with technical teams. - Proven experience delivering solutions onsite for enterprise customers and adapting effectively to customer production schedules and operating environments. - Strong technical writing skills, with the ability to produce documentation that is useful to both engineers and executive stakeholders. - Demonstrated ability to identify unrealistic scope or timelines early, communicate concerns with evidence, and help teams make informed delivery decisions. - Product-minded approach, with the ability to distinguish reusable platform capabilities from genuinely customer-specific requirements. - Strong commercial awareness and the ability to consider cost, scope, customer value, technical risk, and long-term maintainability when making engineering decisions. - High autonomy, curiosity, sound judgment, and comfort working in an environment where processes and requirements may still be evolving. - Willingness to work directly in customer facilities and represent the technical organization independently in enterprise environments. ### Benefits - **Three-month contract** with the opportunity to make a direct impact on the development and deployment of robotics solutions. - **Remote, United States-based** working arrangement between customer site visits and development work. - Opportunity to work at the intersection of **industrial robotics, computer vision, AI, automation, and physical logistics**. - Direct ownership of robotics solutions from field discovery through architecture, development, commissioning, testing, and handoff. - High level of autonomy and visibility, with direct interaction with enterprise customers and senior operational stakeholders. - Opportunity to work with industrial robotics platforms, PLCs, ROS/ROS 2, computer vision systems, industrial protocols, and modern software architectures. - Exposure to high-volume distribution environments and complex real-world automation challenges. - Opportunity to help establish reusable robotics capabilities rather than delivering isolated customer integrations. - Potential to influence product direction by identifying which field-proven capabilities should become part of the broader platform. - Collaboration with engineering, AI, product, and customer-facing teams in a highly entrepreneurial environment. - Opportunity to work on applications spanning palletizing and pallet sorting, with potential expansion into auditing, pick-and-pack validation, and material handling. - Compensation and any additional benefits are determined by the hiring company and will be discussed during the recruitment process.