Hardware Development Engineer-Sight Vertical

Ford Model e U.S.; Redford Charter Township (MI); On-site; USD 85,000 - 193,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, vision coverage

Paid time off

Relocation assistance

Vehicle discount program

Job summary

Ford Motor Company is seeking a Hardware Engineer to own the hardware backbone of Sight.Sense and Sight.Vision products across global manufacturing environments. You will manage cameras, sensors, edge devices, and related networking and power solutions, ensuring compliant, scalable hardware across sites.

The role emphasizes establishing common hardware standards, partnering with product engineering and plant teams, and driving efficient fleet management for production intelligence solutions.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical/Computer Engineering or Mechatronics, or equivalent practical experience.
• 5+ years designing, testing or deploying industrial cameras and sensors.
• Knowledge of Ethernet/GigE, TCP/IP, DHCP, DNS; network troubleshooting.
• Familiarity with safety certifications (UL, CE) for hardware.
• Experience with MQTT and PLC interfacing.
• Strong cross‑functional communication with engineers and plant floor personnel.

Responsibilities

• Own hardware backbone for camera, sensor and edge devices across Sight.Sense and Sight.Vision.
• Set hardware standards, drive sourcing, testing, safety certification and fleet management.
• Collaborate with product engineering, manufacturing and plant teams to avoid site‑by‑site bespoke solutions.
• Define and govern hardware standards across multiple deployments.

Skills

Industrial cameras

Machine vision hardware

Industrial sensors

Data acquisition hardware

Industrial networking

MQTT protocols

Cross-functional comms

Hardware retrofitting

Education

Bachelors: Electrical Engineering

Bachelors: Computer Engineering

Bachelors: Mechatronics

Equivalent practical experience

Tools

NVIDIA products

GCP cloud storage

Industrial PCs

Job description

Ford Motor Company has endured and thrived for more than 118 years by reimagining how things are built. Today, Ford is leading a once-in-a-generation transformation in manufacturing — scaling EVs, integrating humanoid robotics, additive manufacturing, AI vision, and digital platforms into one seamless operating system: the Ford Production System (FPS/FPS+) that operates within the FAST framework. Ford Motor Company is undergoing a historic industrial shift — from building great vehicles to building great systems that scale across them. The Advanced Industrial Technology & Platforms (AITP) organisation was created to operationalise that shift. Our job is not to deploy isolated tools; it is to build a system that learns from factory truth, transforms it into scalable platforms, and turns those platforms into enterprise business value. Advanced Industrial Technology and Platforms (ATP) is a new, centralised organisation designed to position Ford to lead industrial innovation. This team will accelerate our digital evolution and manufacturing excellence — advancing the modernisation of our Ford Manufacturing operations with cutting‑edge technology. As part of Ford Manufacturing, ATP is designed to integrate directly into our manufacturing sites, partner across teams (GME, safety, etc.) and drive innovation from initial idea to full implementation.

ATP is led by Managing Director Yung Fung, reporting to Ford Chief Manufacturing Officer Bryce Currie. This structure includes four vertical business units — focused on specific technology stacks — and four horizontals — shared services designed to ensure scale, deployment, and operational consistency.

As part of the AITP organisation, the Sight Vertical is responsible for building an end‑to‑end business around AI/ML anomaly detection products, operating as two product families.

Sight.Sense detects anomalies in parametric data: Sense.Machine (MiniTerms) for machine performance anomaly prediction and optimisation; Sense.Tooling (AI ToolSense) for tooling life optimisation; Sense.Energy for optimisation of supplies consumption; Sense.Stamping for stamping process anomaly prediction and surface splits; and Sense.MILO for in‑process test quality anomaly detection.

Sight.Vision detects anomalies in image data: Vision.Scout for in‑station visual error proofing across manual and automated processes; Vision.Surface for surface defect detection in components and vehicle bodies through the complete manufacturing process; and Vision.Station for manual process monitoring and anomaly detection covering productivity, quality and ergonomics.

The Sight Vertical product portfolio are set to converge on the Sight Anomaly Platform, which builds on Ford's Core Systems layer (Core OS, CoreDS, Core AI and CoreApps/FPS+). Together they form Ford's scalable platform to deliver, process quality assurance, and zero‑downtime, zero‑defect manufacturing.

How the Sight Vertical Works

The Sight Vertical operates through value‑focused, cross‑functional product teams across two product families: Sight.Sense and Sight.Vision, each led by a Head of Product Family. Product Managers lead the product problem, desired outcome and priority. Engineers and product designers work with them to discover and deliver effective solutions. Engineering Managers retain people, capacity, technical‑system and engineering‑health accountability.

This is a vertical‑level role working across both product families. Priorities are agreed between the two Heads of Product and their Engineering Managers, so that your effort is directed by portfolio value. In addition, ATP Core provides the non‑product engineering expertise the verticals depend on — enterprise standards, architecture, industrial controls, cybersecurity and platform guidance. This role holds a matrix reporting line into ATP Core to ensure alignment with those standards and ready access to that expertise.

Functional & Technical Knowledge

Minimum Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Mechatronics or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 5+ years of hands‑on experience specifying, testing or deploying industrial cameras, machine vision hardware, industrial sensors and data‑acquisition hardware, or edge compute devices.
• Working knowledge of industrial networking concepts — Ethernet/GigE, network switches, jumbo frames and packet‑level troubleshooting — and of protocols including Dynamic DNS, DHCP and TCP/IP.
• Familiarity with safety and regulatory certification processes (UL, cUL, CE) for electrical and electronic hardware.
• Experience with messaging and integration protocols common in industrial vision systems (for example MQTT) and PLC interfacing concepts.
• Strong cross‑functional communication skills; comfortable working with software engineers, product managers and plant‑floor personnel.
• Experience retrofitting hardware onto in‑production manufacturing equipment without disrupting output.
• Fluent professional English.

Preferred Requirements

• Direct experience with industrial PCs and NVIDIA products for AI applications.
• Experience supporting hardware fleets at scale across multiple manufacturing sites.
• Familiarity with cloud image storage and retention pipelines (for example GCP) as they relate to hardware warranty and data lifecycle policy.
• Manufacturing or automotive plant‑floor experience.
• Experience developing and governing hardware standards — device, BOM and installation standards, distinct from controls standards.
• Experience with parametric condition monitoring — vibration, current, temperature, pressure or energy metering — and its acquisition hardware.
• Familiarity with OT network segmentation and plant‑floor connectivity constraints.
• Additional European language (Spanish or German).

Success in Role

• Standard hardware specifications and bills of material exist for the major Sight deployment patterns and are actively used.
• New deployments require less bespoke plant hardware engineering because approved patterns are available and trusted.
• Camera, sensor, edge and connectivity failures reduce over time because root causes are corrected through standards and fleet actions.
• Hardware evidence supports TRL and MRL progression with repeatable test results and clear compliance documentation.
• Fleet inventory, firmware, certificate, warranty and end‑of‑life risks are visible and actively managed.
• Launch and Deployment Engineers, Product Managers and plant teams can apply hardware standards without relying on one‑off expert judgement.
• Hardware choices support both Sense and Vision product needs while avoiding unnecessary duplication across the portfolio.

The Opportunity

Ford's Advanced Technology Platforms (ATP) Sight organisation is seeking a Hardware Engineer to own the hardware backbone of our manufacturing intelligence products across both computer‑vision and parametric sensing. You will be the technical owner for cameras, sensors and signal‑acquisition devices, edge compute devices, power supply mechanisms, and network infrastructure deployed on Ford plant floors globally — spanning specification, sourcing, testing, safety and regulatory certification, and fleet management once systems are in production.

This role supports all Sight Vertical products, with near‑term focus on Sight.IQ vision hardware and on establishing common hardware standards for Sense products already deployed at plant scale. It sits at the boundary between product engineering and manufacturing reality: you will make sure that Sight.Sense and Sight.Vision products are not dependent on one‑off hardware choices, supplier‑specific workarounds, or site‑by‑site engineering judgement.

We are seeking a motivated candidate with a penchant for learning to join our high‑performing, energetic team. The role suits an engineer who enjoys working across different domains — image capture and parametric signal acquisition — and who wants to set standards that scale rather than solve each plant individually.

• Immediate medical, dental, vision and prescription drug coverage
• Flexible family care days, paid parental leave, new parent ramp‑up programmes, subsidised back‑up child care and more
• Family building benefits including adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, fertility treatments, and more
• Vehicle discount programme for employees and family members and management leases
• Tuition assistance
• Established and active employee resource groups
• Paid time off for individual and team community service
• A generous schedule of paid holidays, including the week between Christmas and New Year's Day
• Paid time off and the option to purchase additional vacation time.

For a detailed look at our benefits, click here: https://fordcareers.co/GSR This position ranges from salary grade 6-8 and ranges from $85,400-$192,900. Final determination of salary grade will be based on candidate's skills and experience, and base salary will be set within the applicable range according to job scope, responsibility and competitive market value. Visa sponsorship IS available for this position. Relocation assistance IS provided for this position. Candidates for positions with Ford Motor Company must be legally authorized to work in the United States. Verification of employment eligibility will be required at the time of hire. We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, colour, age, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability status or protected veteran status. In the United States, if you need a reasonable accommodation for the online application process due to a disability, please call 1-888-336-0660.