Costing Engineer

Exponent; Bengaluru; On-site; INR 900,000 - 1,500,000; Full time

Job summary

Exponent in Bengaluru, India, is seeking a Costing Engineer with 5–10 years of experience in automotive/EV costing. You will read drawings and specs, develop should-cost analyses, and support sourcing with supplier negotiations.

The role sits in the Strategic Sourcing team and involves building cost models, utilities, and process-route decisions. Responsibilities include cost breakdowns, tooling cost estimation, supplier visits, and maintaining cost databases with material and labor norms.

Qualifications

• 5–10 years of experience in product costing / should-costing / value engineering in automotive or EV OEM / Tier-1 supplier.
• Ability to read 2D/3D drawings, GD&T, and process specs to define manufacturing routes.
• Experience building and maintaining costing databases with material, labor, and overhead norms.
• Experience with make-vs-buy, design-to-cost, and negotiations with suppliers.

Responsibilities

• Prepare should-cost breakdowns for new parts and for existing parts to baseline current spend.
• Interpret drawings and specs to define manufacturing routes.
• Provide target prices before RFQ and perform gap analysis after quotes.
• Build and maintain costing databases (indices, machine-hour rates, labour, cycle times).
• Estimate tooling costs and recommend amortisation vs one-time payment.
• Visit supplier floors to validate processes and build cost models.
• Support buyers in negotiations and price reviews.
• Drive VA/VE and design-to-cost initiatives with cross-functional teams.
• Track cost baseline and savings opportunities.

Skills

Costing

Should-costing

VA/VE

Excel

Teamcenter

Analytical

Education

B.E./B.Tech in Mechanical Engineering

Cost engineering certification (ICWA/CMA)

Tools

Teamcenter

MS Excel

LME/MCX price indices

Job description

Role: Costing Engineer

Department: Strategic Sourcing Location: Bengaluru, India Experience: 5-8 Years

Your Team:

You’ll be working with the Strategic Sourcing Team.

Our philosophy:

Break. Believe. Build.

Break stuff, break assumptions, break the thumb rule.

Believe in the team, the process, and through failures.

Build fast, build passionately, build to simplify.

Own it like you mean it.

What you’ll do:

Key responsibilities

• Prepare detailed should-cost breakdowns for all new parts (RFQ / development stage) and for existing parts to set a baseline for current spend. Each breakdown covers raw material (gross and net weight, scrap, yield), process cost, tooling amortisation, labour, overheads, rejection, profit, packaging and freight.
• Read and interpret 2D/3D drawings, GD&T, and material and surface-treatment specs to define the manufacturing route.
• Give buyers target prices before RFQ, and run gap analysis (quote vs. should-cost) after quotes come in.
• Build and maintain the costing database: RM indices (LME/MCX/polymer), machine-hour rates, labour rates, cycle-time norms, and overhead and profit norms.
• Estimate tooling costs (dies, moulds, fixtures, gauges) and recommend amortisation vs. one-time payment.
• Visit supplier shop floors to check process routes, cycle times and capacity, and build supplier-specific cost models.
• Support buyers in negotiations, annual price reviews and claims for raw-material price variation.
• Drive VA/VE and design-to-cost with design, component development and program teams. Run make-vs-buy and process-route comparisons.
• Track the cost baseline, cost-reduction opportunities and savings realized.

Process and commodity costing expertise required

• Aluminium extrusion and aluminium die casting (HPDC/LPDC/gravity)
• Ferrous casting (grey and SG iron, steel)
• Sheet metal forming, stamping (progressive/transfer tools, press tonnage, nesting), laser/turret cutting, bending
• Fabrication and welding (MIG, TIG, spot, projection, robotic)
• All machining processes (turning, VMC/HMC, drilling, grinding, multi-axis CNC)
• Powder coating, plating, anodising, screen printing
• Plastic injection moulding (including insert moulding and overmoulding)
• Rubber injection and compression moulding
• Vacuum casting and 3D printing / prototyping (FDM, SLA, SLS, MJF, metal AM)
• Wire harness (cable, terminals, connectors, crimping, assembly and testing)

What matters to us :

• Strong grasp of manufacturing processes, machine capacities and how cycle times are built up
• Good working knowledge of materials and their market price drivers
• Advanced Excel, Experience with Teamcenter
• Analytical, detail-oriented, and comfortable defending cost logic with suppliers

Automotive / EV / 2W–3W / CV / battery-pack supply chain

• OEM costing cell or Tier-1 estimation function
• Exposure to battery packs, chargers, enclosures, busbars and harnesses is a strong plus

Experience: 5–10 years in product costing / should-costing / value engineering at an automotive or EV OEM, or a Tier-1 supplier

Education: B.E./B.Tech in Mechanical, Production or Industrial Engineering (ICWA/CMA or cost engineering certification is a plus)

About Us:

Exponent is building the energy stack powering commercial EVs in India. Our proprietary battery and charging technology enables safe, reliable 15-minute rapid charging while delivering a 3,000-cycle battery life warranty using standard lithium-ion cells. Today, our platform powers high-utilisation commercial vehicles - from three-wheelers to intercity buses, making electric mobility rapid, more reliable and more affordable than petroleum.

Founded by Arun Vinayak (Founding Partner & Former Chief Product Officer, Ather Energy), Exponent is a 250+ member team of passionate builders solving some of the toughest engineering challenges in energy.

If solving hard engineering problems across mechanics, thermal systems, power electronics, manufacturing, and the charging network, while staying obsessed with customer experience excites you, we'd love to build with you.