Lead Manufacturing Engineer

TAR; Odessa (TX); On-site; USD 110,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

TAR in West Texas is seeking a Manufacturing Lead to run the ship and crews that scale our autonomous assembly for data-center hardware. You will lead a small team of assemblers, machinists, and a welder, owning everything they build, fix, and modify on site: robot subassemblies, racking, field tooling, carts, and fixtures that don’t exist yet.

One week you’re standing up an assembly cell for racking tables, next you’re welding an overhead rig to ease fatigue.

Qualifications

• 5-7+ years in manufacturing engineering for complex electromechanical or robotic hardware.
• Experience building or scaling an assembly line.
• Hands-on hardware building experience: machining, fabrication, wiring, assembly.
• Experience with quality control systems and root-cause corrective actions.
• Vendor/supplier management experience.
• Ability to work with limited resources and tight timelines.

Responsibilities

• Lead the manufacturing crew, set daily priorities, schedule, train staff, and maintain quality.
• Lead Design for Manufacturability reviews with engineering to cut cost and time.
• Define and implement quality control processes at each assembly stage.
• Design, select, and qualify tooling, fixtures, and test equipment.
• Own root-cause analysis and corrective actions for build and field issues.
• Manage supplier and vendor relationships for inputs and outsourced processes.
• Build and document standard work, travelers, and training materials.
• Partner with hardware engineering to translate roadmap into capacity and staffing.

Skills

Leadership

Manufacturing

Robotics

DFM

Quality-control

Vendor management

Field deployment

Education

Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering

Tools

SolidWorks

Lean/Six Sigma

CAM/CNC tooling

Fixture design

Job description

TAR’s mission is to power intelligence for the world. We are building the world’s first off-grid power plant for data centers powered by renewable technologies.

We firmly believe AI should be built in the US for the benefit of all people. For that, power must be fast, clean and scalable. We are singularly focused on delivering GW-scale power faster than anyone has ever done, by rethinking every layer of the stack.

We vertically integrate to solve every bottleneck, from racking systems to power electronics to dispatch algorithms to on-site construction.

Leave your mark on the future of civilization-scale energy infrastructure.

Company

TAR is both a hardware and software company, we are building out massive, critical, physical infrastructure. TAR is working directly with one of the largest compute providers to scale and deploy 5GWs by 2028.

• High ownership. High Agency. Own project end-to-end. Great people don’t need to be managed.
• Speed. We achieve great things on incredible timelines. We push ourselves to go faster.
• First principles. No ego. No hierarchy. Challenge every assumption.
• Passion. Solving the energy problem is one of the largest challenges that faces the world now and in the future.

About the role TAR runs a test site in West Texas. It’s where our robots leave the lab and meet real dirt, wind, and heat. It’s also where we learn fast what breaks. Every fix, fixture, and process we prove here becomes how we build at gigawatt scale.

As Manufacturing Lead, you run the ship and the crews that make that loop work. You lead a small team of assemblers, machinists, and a welder. You own everything they build, fix, and modify on site: robot subassemblies, racking, field tooling, carts, and fixtures that don’t exist yet. One week you’re standing up an assembly cell for racking tables. Next, you’re designing and welding an overhead rig because a hand tool is wearing the crew out.

You turn what we learn in the field into standard work, so the next build is faster, and the next crew gets it right the first time. This is a hands-on, on-site leadership role. You’ll spend more time on the floor and in the field than at a desk, working directly with our hardware engineers in San Francisco and the operators running the robots

Responsibilities

• Lead the manufacturing crew. You set daily priorities, run the schedule, train people, and hold the quality bar.
• Lead Design for Manufacturability reviews with engineering, driving design changes upstream that cut cost, assembly time, and failure modes before hardware reaches the line.
• Define and implement quality control processes and inspection criteria at each stage of assembly, ensuring hardware built for austere field conditions meets reliability and durability standards before it ships.
• Design, select, and qualify the tooling, fixtures, and test equipment needed to run the line, working hands-on with technicians to debug and refine processes in real time.
• Own root-cause analysis and corrective action for build and field failures, feeding fixes back into process and design to prevent recurrence.
• Manage supplier and vendor relationships for manufacturing inputs, materials, and outsourced processes, holding partners accountable for quality and schedule.
• Build and document standard work, process travelers, and training materials so the line scales with new hires without losing quality.
• Partner with hardware engineering leadership to translate the product roadmap into manufacturing capacity and staffing plans.

Qualifications

• 5-7+ years in manufacturing engineering, with direct experience standing up or scaling an assembly line for complex electromechanical or robotic hardware.
• Demonstrated experience across the full manufacturing value chain: DFM, tooling, process development, quality planning, and documentation.
• Hands-on experience personally building or assembling hardware, including machining, fabrication, wiring, and assembly, rather than process design from a desk alone.
• Experience implementing quality control systems and driving root-cause and corrective action in a production environment.
• Track record managing vendors and suppliers for manufacturing inputs and outsourced processes.
• Comfortable working with limited resources and tight timelines, standing the line up while it is still coming together rather than running one that already exists.

Nice to have

• Experience manufacturing hardware intended for austere, field, or defense-adjacent operating environments.
• Experience with robotics or complex electromechanical systems specifically, rather than general consumer electronics.
• Familiarity with Lean/Six Sigma or formal quality systems such as ISO or AS9100.
• Prior experience building a manufacturing team or line from near-zero, rather than improving one that already runs.