Senior Reliability Engineer

Salience Labs; Oxford; On-site; GBP 70,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

Salience Labs Limited is seeking a Senior Reliability Engineer to own reliability, qualification and life-testing across hardware development programmes. You’ll partner with engineering, product, manufacturing and external partners to set reliability requirements and translate test results into actionable recommendations.

The role emphasizes independent ownership, strong technical communication and collaboration with OSATs, suppliers and internal teams to ensure evidence meets commercial

Qualifications

• Significant industrial experience in semiconductor, electronics or hardware product reliability.
• Strong knowledge of semiconductor devices, electronics and packaging.
• Experience developing and executing reliability or qualification plans.
• Understanding of reliability testing, life testing and product qualification principles.
• Ability to analyse complex datasets and draw practical engineering conclusions.
• Experience identifying trends and potential failure mechanisms from test data.
• Strong problem-solving and clear communication of technical topics.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain reliability and qualification plans for semiconductor-based hardware.
• Define appropriate component, assembly and product-level reliability testing.
• Plan and oversee life-test and qualification activities.
• Analyse reliability data and translate results into actionable engineering recommendations.
• Review test results, identify trends and investigate potential failure mechanisms.
• Produce professional reliability reports for internal and customer use.
• Collaborate with engineering teams to embed reliability in product development.
• Work with external suppliers and manufacturing partners on test execution and corrective actions.
• Audit reliability work carried out by external partners.
• Support supplier visits and technical reviews as required.

Skills

Semiconductor reliability

Electronics packaging

Life-testing experience

Data analysis

Test planning

Supplier engagement

Technical reporting

Stakeholder management

Job description

Job Overview

We are looking for a Senior Reliability Engineer to join our Manufacturing team and take ownership of reliability, qualification and life-testing activities across our hardware development programmes.

We are looking for a Senior Reliability Engineer to join our Manufacturing team and take ownership of reliability, qualification and life-testing activities across our hardware development programmes.

You will work closely with engineering, product, manufacturing and external partners to define reliability requirements, develop qualification plans, interpret test data and ensure issues are understood and addressed before products reach the field.

This is a senior individual contributor role for someone with strong industrial experience in semiconductor or electronics reliability. You should be comfortable moving between technical analysis, supplier engagement, qualification planning and clear communication with both engineering and commercial stakeholders.

You will also work directly with external manufacturing and test partners, helping guide their reliability activities, reviewing results and ensuring that the quality of evidence meets the standards required for commercial deployment.

What You'll Be Doing

• Develop and maintain reliability and qualification plans for semiconductor-based hardware
• Define appropriate component, assembly and product-level reliability testing
• Plan and oversee life-test and qualification activities
• Analyse reliability data and translate results into clear, actionable engineering recommendations
• Review test results, identify trends and investigate potential failure mechanisms
• Produce clear, professional reliability reports for internal and customer-facing use
• Work closely with engineering teams to ensure reliability considerations are incorporated into product development
• Collaborate with manufacturing, product and failure analysis teams to resolve reliability issues
• Work directly with external suppliers and manufacturing partners on test execution, qualification and corrective actions
• Review and audit reliability work carried out by external partners
• Support supplier visits and technical reviews where required
• Help develop and continuously improve reliability processes, methodologies and reporting standards
• Communicate technical findings clearly to both specialist and non-specialist stakeholders
• Take ownership of reliability activities from initial planning through to final review and acceptance

The role will have significant ownership over reliability and life-test reporting, with responsibility for ensuring work is appropriately planned, executed, reviewed and communicated from start to finish.

What We're Looking For

• Significant industrial experience in semiconductor, electronics or hardware product reliability
• Strong knowledge of semiconductor devices, electronics and packaging
• Experience developing and executing reliability or qualification plans
• A strong understanding of reliability testing, life testing and product qualification principles
• The ability to analyse complex datasets and turn them into practical engineering conclusions
• Experience identifying trends, risks and potential failure mechanisms from test data
• Strong problem-solving and critical-thinking skills
• The ability to communicate complex technical subjects clearly and concisely
• Experience producing professional technical reports
• Strong stakeholder-management skills across multidisciplinary engineering teams
• Experience working with external suppliers, manufacturing partners or test houses
• The confidence to challenge technical conclusions and provide clear guidance where required
• Strong organisational skills and the ability to manage multiple priorities while maintaining focus on key deliverables

This is a senior role, so we are looking for someone who can operate with a high degree of independence and take ownership of reliability projects rather than simply execute predefined test plans.

Even Better If You

• Experience in semiconductor product qualification
• Experience in a high-volume manufacturing environment
• Strong knowledge of semiconductor packaging and assembly
• Experience working directly with OSATs or other outsourced manufacturing partners
• Familiarity with recognised semiconductor or electronics reliability standards
• Experience auditing supplier reliability or qualification activities
• Experience supporting customer reliability requirements
• A background in failure analysis or root-cause investigation
• Experience developing reliability programmes or processes from the ground up
• Exposure to data-centre, communications or other high-performance electronics environments
• Experience balancing technical rigour with commercial and programme timelines

Relevant backgrounds might include semiconductor devices, electronics manufacturing, packaging, product qualification, reliability engineering or another technically demanding high-volume product environment.

This is an opportunity to take meaningful ownership of reliability within a fast-moving deep-tech environment, working across engineering, manufacturing and external partners to ensure advanced hardware is robust, well understood and ready for deployment.

You will have the scope to influence how reliability is approached as the organisation grows, from defining qualification methodologies through to improving supplier engagement and the quality of reliability data used across the business.

The role is UK-based and will require international travel, including to suppliers and partners across Asia, the US and Europe.

Salience Labs Limited is a leader in photonic solutions targeting connectivity for AI datacenter infrastructure.

Backed by over a decade of research from the University of Oxford in the UK and the University of Münster in Germany, Salience's innovative developments in photonic switching technology enable high-speed, ultra-low latency networking fabrics that remove infrastructure bottlenecks for AI workloads.