Industrial Designer

The Robot Age; Sunnyvale (CA); Hybrid; USD 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Applied Intuition is hiring its first industrial designer to join a design team serving highly technical autonomy users. The role translates hardware and software constraints into physical concepts, prototypes, CAD, CMF direction, and design documentation.

This human-factors-heavy design position partners with engineers, product managers, and business teams on complex autonomous-machine workflows, building prototypes and ensuring production-ready concepts.

Qualifications

• Industrial design experience in fast-moving technical environments.
• Strong human factors judgment for products shaped by engineering constraints.
• Ability to prototype hardware concepts for software-driven products.
• Background in HCI, industrial design, or a related design field.
• Robotics, drone, or startup experience is useful.

Responsibilities

• Develop design themes for hardware concepts from sketch through prototype and production intent.
• Build and iterate physical prototypes that inform product architecture.
• Create sketches, CAD, CMF strategy, prototypes, and documentation to communicate design intent.
• Collaborate with product, engineering, and business development on technical product problems.
• Work inside a fast release cadence while handling incomplete inputs.

Skills

Industrial design

Human factors

Hardware prototyping

Cross-functional collaboration

Education

HCI/Industrial Design background

Tools

CAD software

Job description

What the role actually is

Applied Intuition is hiring its first industrial designer for a design team serving highly technical autonomy users. The role translates hardware and software constraints into physical concepts, prototypes, CAD, CMF direction, and design documentation.

This is a human-factors-heavy design role for someone comfortable working with engineers, product managers, and business teams on complex autonomous-machine workflows.

What you would work on

• Develop design themes for hardware concepts from sketch through prototype and production intent
• Build and iterate physical prototypes that inform product architecture
• Create sketches, CAD, CMF strategy, prototypes, and documentation to communicate design intent
• Collaborate with product, engineering, and business development on technical product problems
• Work inside Applied's fast release cadence while handling incomplete or fragmented inputs

What they are asking for

• Industrial design experience in fast-moving technical environments
• Strong human factors judgment for products shaped by engineering constraints
• Ability to prototype hardware concepts for software-driven products
• Background in HCI, industrial design, or a related design field
• Robotics, drone, or startup experience is called out as useful

Why this one is worth a look

Industrial design roles in autonomy companies can be rare, especially when they are the first seat on the team. This one is about making complex physical AI systems understandable and usable, not just making hardware look polished.