Hardware Reliability Engineer – Ecosystem

Socket.dev; Cupertino (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Apple in Cupertino seeks a hardware reliability engineer to join the Reliability team working on iPad accessories and input devices. You will partner with design, manufacturing, and quality teams from concept to mass production to identify risks, develop tests, and assess field stresses to drive design improvements.

You will lead failure analysis, justify tests with user behavior analysis, and guide corrective actions.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree in a hardware-focused field with 3+ years of industry experience.
• Experience performing product characterization including mechanical stress tests, shock/drop/vibration testing, environmental testing, etc.
• Proven written and verbal communication skills.
• Proficiency in iWork and Microsoft Office, including Keynote, PowerPoint, Excel.

Responsibilities

• Develop tests to evaluate product performance and identify risks from concept to mass production.
• Work with cross-functional teams to understand failures and recommend corrective actions.
• Rigorously justify tests with well-characterized user behaviors and field stresses.
• Drive failure analysis and lead the team through complex problem solving.

Skills

Communication skills

Cross-functional collaboration

Presentation skills

Proficiency in iWork & MS Office

Travel willingness up to 10%

Education

Bachelor's Degree in hardware-focused field (ME, MS, CE, EE, etc.)

Tools

Weibull analysis

JMP

Failure Analysis techniques (Optical Microscopy, X-ray/CT, SEM/EDS)

Design of Experiments

Failure Modes and Effects Analysis

AI tools for efficiency

Job description

We are looking for you to work with our diverse ecosystem hardware engineering teams! As the Reliability team, we are responsible for ensuring and improving the durability and reliability of Apple's products. To achieve that, we partner with multiple engineering teams from the beginning (concept) to the end (field returns) of a product lifecycle by helping to explore new technologies and understand how customers will use our products. If you have a passion for constant learning and innovative engineering products, you will fit right in. You will develop and implement creative reliability tests on new hardware programs, quantify reliability risk, support failure analysis resulting from these tests, and advise the executive team on the best path forward. Our work ensures that our products meet the rigorous expectations of our customers and survive whatever our customers can throw at them - we break things so you don't have to. Come join our team! Our team works specifically on iPad accessories and input devices - products such as Keyboards, Folios, Pencils, etc, and the interactions these products have with their respective systems. We work closely with the design, manufacturing, and quality teams to evaluate the performance of our products through the suite of reliability tests that we design and use these results to motivate design and process changes iteratively to ultimately deliver better products to our customers. We have a hand in every softgoods product that is released and both design the tests and analyze the test results to suite each products' specific use cases and product definitions.

Description

You will be responsible for ensuring our products meet the rigorous expectations of our customers and survive what life may throw at them. To do so, you will be working with cross-functional teams from concept to mass production to identify risks in the design, develop tests to evaluate the performance of the product with regards to those concerns, work with the team to understand failures, and recommend and verify the efficacy of the corresponding corrective actions. You will need to rigorously justify your tests with well characterized user behaviors and thorough understanding of field stresses, and a strong technical background to not only participate in failure analysis (FA), but also drive FA and lead the team through complex problem solving. We will push the performance of our products to the limits of the material and design, and in those cases, you will need to prepare comprehensive risk assessments to fully quantify any field exposure we may have.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree in a hardware-focused field (ME, MS, CE, EE, etc.) with 3+ years of industry experience
• Experience performing product characterization including mechanical stress tests, shock/drop/vibration testing, environmental testing, etc.
• Proven written and verbal communication skills
• Proficiency in iWork and Microsoft Office, including but not limited to Keynote, Powerpoint, Excel, etc.

Preferred Qualifications

• Statistical experience such as Weibull, JMP, or familiarity with accelerated test models
• Familiar with Failure Analysis techniques (Optical Microscopy, X-ray/CT, Scanning Electron Microscopy/Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy, etc.), and the ability to use failure analysis methodology to derive a root cause of failure
• Understanding of Design of Experiments
• Imaginative approach to Failure Modes and Effects Analysis
• Ability to make clear and concise slides and presentations when vital
• Ability to use AI tools to improve work efficiency.
• Strong attention to detail and curiosity of how technologies work
• Collaborative attitude and ability to cross-functionally work effectively
• Ability to travel internationally without restrictions (up to 10%)
• Curiosity about how technologies work.