Manufacturing Engineer

Job Description
Pacific Fusion aims to power the world with abundant, affordable, clean energy.

We are rapidly designing and building a pulser-driven inertial fusion system to achieve net facility gain (more fusion energy output than stored energy input). In parallel, we are developing the key components required to build affordable fusion systems.

Our plans are ambitious. We have raised over $900M so far from incredible investors, resourcing us to deliver on these plans. We are bringing together the best scientists, engineers, and operators from the fusion community, hard tech industry, and other sectors. We are united by a shared sense of urgency to provide clean power for the world, particularly managing climate change while meeting growing global energy demand. You can read more about us in this letter from our founders.

Why Join Us:

• Build what doesn't exist yet - Work on first-of-its-kind advanced energy infrastructure in a fast-moving, technically ambitious environment
• Grow with us: Work alongside leading engineers, operators, and investors in a mission-driven and ambitious environment
• Competitive pay, full benefits, and equity in a company shaping the future of energy and space

About The Role
The Opportunity:

The Manufacturing Engineer is responsible for evaluating current manual processes and making them more efficient, robust and reliable through improved instructions, tooling or implementing automation solutions.

This role is ideal for someone with strong factory-floor instincts, who understands how to build things at rate and with an eye towards economics based automation in the real world-not just on paper-and who thrives in a fast-moving, build-focused environment.

In this role your work will optimize processes and enable production employees, engineers and scientists across the organization as they bring our demonstration system online.

What You'll Do:

• Set-up and analyze manufacturing processes to identify assembly sequence and tooling improvements as well as automation opportunities that reduce labor and increase throughput, capacity, capability, and yield
• Collaborate with design engineering to influence product DFM/DFA (Design for Manufacturability/Automation) to ease automation integration
• Design and develop tools that aid in error free assembly, improve safety and quality
• Write and or edit electronic work instructions for repetitive assembly steps to document the best known practices, incorporate inspection steps to verify quality, document traceability and data collection steps as needed
• Specify, source, and deploy off-the-shelf or custom automation equipment including conveyors, actuators, robotics, inspection stations, and tooling
• Write and maintain documentation for equipment setup, operation, troubleshooting, and maintenance
• Support process development and initial production, with a focus on root cause analysis and continuous improvement
• Facilitate change management on the facility floor; including manufacturing validation
• Partner closely with area managers, manufacturing technicians, mechanical engineers, and quality to ensure equipment performance aligns with production goals

Requirements

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Mechatronics, Manufacturing Engineering, Industrial Engineering, or related equivalent experience in this field
• 5+ years of experience in manufacturing engineering or automation in a relatable production environment
• Hands-on experience developing and integrating automation equipment, including mechanical and control systems (pneumatics, motion control, sensors)
• Experience with robotic arms (e.g., UR, Fanuc, ABB), end-of-arm tooling, and collaborative automation
• Strong CAD proficiency (e.g., PTC Creo) and ability to design tooling and fixturing
• Demonstrated capability with PLCs, industrial communication protocols, and control systems (e.g., Allen-Bradley, Siemens, Beckhoff, etc.)
• Solid understanding of process validation, process capability, and yield improvement methodologies and dashboard reporting showing system health
• Experience managing external automation integrators or machine builders
• Familiarity with MES, SCADA, or factory data collection tools
• Comfortable operating in an evolving, ambiguous, and cross-functional startup environment

Preferred Qualifications

• Background in electromechanical product assembly or electronics manufacturing.
• Familiarity with ERP/MRP systems.
• Familiarity with datavis tools and visual factory concepts that use dashboards, IoT data, and visual tools to display real-time facility performance.
• Proficiency with Twincat, Python or similar scripting languages for automation/data acquisition.

Benefits

Full range of competitive benefits including medical, dental, vision, retirement plans, and PTO