Member of Technical Staff, Controls Engineer

Industrial Next (YC W22); San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive base salary

Meaningful equity

Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage

Relocation support to SF Bay Area

Job summary

Industrial Next (YC W22) is seeking an experienced professional in San Francisco for a role focused on low-level control systems for robotic platforms. You will design and integrate control systems, working on real hardware alongside a small, dedicated team.

Applicants should have a strong background in robotics with hands-on experience in real-time control system design. The position offers competitive salary, meaningful equity, and relocation support.

Qualifications

• 5+ years controls work shipped on real robots (industrial, mobile, or humanoid).
• Experience with whole-body or coordinated multi-system control on real hardware.
• Comfortable across the stack from motor-level current control up to task-space trajectory tracking.

Responsibilities

• Design low-level control across wheeled-humanoid and mobile-manipulator platforms.
• Integrate vendor SDKs and tune compliance, impedance, and force control.
• Build the safety, interlock, and hardware-in-the-loop test layer.

Skills

Real-time control system design

Compliance / impedance / force control

Industrial arm SDK experience

Low-level integration

Education

BS in EE / MechE / Robotics / CS

Tools

EtherCAT

ROS2 control stack

Job description

Why this role matters

Low-level control is the substrate every other layer in our stack rests on — multiple coordinated systems (arm, mobile base, end-effector, dual-arm) under contact-rich loads at industrial cycle times. If learned policies are right but the controller can’t track them, or if the vendor SDK integration is wrong, the system doesn’t ship — you’ll work across both sides with the controls and integration team.

What you’ll do

• Design low-level control across our wheeled‑humanoid and mobile‑manipulator platforms.
• Integrate vendor SDKs and tune compliance / impedance / force control for contact‑rich tasks.
• Build the safety, interlock, and hardware‑in‑the‑loop test layer.

Required

• Education. BS in EE / MechE / Robotics / CS; MS or PhD a plus.
• Experience. 5+ years controls work shipped on real robots (industrial, mobile, or humanoid).
• Real‑time control system design. Whole‑body or coordinated multi‑system control on real hardware. Comfortable across the stack from motor‑level current control up to task‑space trajectory tracking.
• Industrial arm SDK experience. Hands‑on with at least one of Franka, Flexiv, Universal Robots, ABB, KUKA, or equivalent industrial arm. You’ve used and extended the vendor’s control modes.
• Compliance / impedance / force control. For contact‑rich manipulation tasks; has tuned these on real hardware against real parts.
• Low‑level integration. EtherCAT, motor drivers, encoder calibration, low‑level firmware integration when the vendor stack ends. ROS2 control stack on top.

Strongly preferred

• Whole‑body control or coordinated multi‑arm control on a real platform.
• Hardware‑in‑the‑loop test rig design and automated controller‑validation regression suites.
• Has worked alongside ML or IL teams to deploy learned policies through a control stack — understands what makes a policy "control‑friendly".
• Teleoperation control‑stack work (latency, force feedback, command shaping).
• Tactile or force‑torque sensor integration.
• Industrial deployment experience — factory floor, line‑side commissioning, customer‑site debug.

How we work

• In‑person, on the hardware. SF, on‑site, full‑time. Relocation will be supported.
• Insane work ethic. Startups win by fast speed, focused and relentless pushes.
• High ownership, high equity. Small team, meaningful equity. Your contribution is significant.
• Demanding and fast‑paced. Tight timing constraints, customer commitments, little slack.

If you’ve thrived at SpaceX, Tesla, or other fast‑moving startups, you’ll recognize the energy. If "work‑life balance" is your top filter, we are not the right fit.

What we offer

• Competitive base salary + meaningful equity in an early‑stage, fast‑growing company.
• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage.
• Relocation support to SF Bay Area.
• A team you’ll learn from every day, working on problems that haven’t been solved yet.

Equal opportunity

We are an equal opportunity employer. We hire on merit and welcome candidates from any background.