Vice President of Engineering

Main Duties & Responsibilities:

• Lead and develop a cross-functional engineering organization spanning hardware, mechanical, R&D, firmware, application software, DevOps, and program management.

• Set direction, goals, and development plans for each direct report; coach managers as people leaders and build a culture of accountability, continuous improvement, and psychological safety.

• Own engineering hiring across all disciplines, including hardware, mechanical, R&D, Python, DevOps, and program management, maintaining a high bar for talent at every level.

• Drive org design as the team scales: define leadership needs, develop internal candidates, and build a bench that keeps pace with business growth.

• Partner with the CTO on hardware technology strategy, advising on feasibility, technical risk, and development cost as the product roadmap evolves.

• Hold team accountable for R&D exploration, NPI execution, and stage-gate exit criteria; stay close enough to the work to make sound calls on scope, schedule, and risk.

• Ensure prototype findings, failure modes, and test data are translated into production-ready designs and processes.

• Align with Product on systems architecture and hardware, firmware, and software integration; oversee test, calibration, and characterization standards.

• Drive hardware delivery through the full product lifecycle, including design phases, prototyping, DFM, manufacturing readiness, and schedule confidence — managing trade-offs between performance, cost, manufacturability, and schedule.

• Own engineering response to field performance data, including triage field returns, direct re-characterization efforts, and hold the team accountable for closing design and process improvements.

• Oversee delivery of the customer-facing application suite, including API, database, web front-end, and mobile app, and partner with product team to maintain a realistic roadmap and ship on schedule.

• Own build, deployment, and infrastructure outcomes, including CI/CD, environments, monitoring, reliability, and security.

• Run cross-functional programs through the Program Manager with clear scope, milestones, risk registers, and schedule visibility; hold regular reviews that surface issues early.

• Hold team accountable for full manufacturing readiness, including DFM complete, build SOPs written, test fixtures built, traceability in place, and operator training complete before release to production.

• Monitor production yield and quality data through the Production Manager; escalate and resource issues that require engineering involvement and feed field return data back into design improvements.

• Own the engineering budget, including NRE forecasts, tooling costs, software licensing, and infrastructure spend.

• Partner with Product, Quality, Regulatory, Operations, Sales, and Finance to translate business objectives into executable engineering strategies and realistic delivery plans.

• Report engineering health, including roadmap delivery, schedule confidence, quality, and cost to the CTO and executive team, and represent engineering at the executive and board level.

Skills & Requirements:

• 10+ years of hardware, mechanical engineering, or manufacturing experience with demonstrated people leadership at scale.

• Proven track record taking hardware and manufacturing from concept through high-volume production.

• Deep expertise in mechanical design, systems architecture, design for manufacturing (DFM), and product validation.

• Experience leading multi-disciplinary teams across mechanical, electrical, firmware, software, manufacturing, and supply chain.

• Proficiency in design tools (SolidWorks, etc.) and simulation software (FEA, CFD, etc.).

• Hands-on background in test, calibration, or measurement instrumentation development.

• Experience leading or closely partnering with software and DevOps teams on modern development practices — CI/CD, automated testing, and cloud infrastructure.

• Experience overseeing customer-facing software products: cloud APIs, databases, web applications, and mobile apps.

• Prior experience owning supplier relationships and managing supply chain risk.

• Expertise in product validation, testing, and regulatory compliance.

• Strong program and portfolio management skills; ability to maintain schedule and cost discipline across concurrent workstreams.

• Comfortable representing engineering at the executive and board level, communicating technical trade-offs, manufacturability constraints, and cost implications.

• Bachelors degree or higher in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or related field.

• Industry certifications preferred, such as PMP, Six Sigma, etc.

• Familiarity with regulatory environments (FDA, ISO, CE) is a plus.

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