PCBA / Product Engineer / NPI

Astera Labs; California; On-site; USD 135,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

Astera Labs is seeking a Senior Technical Recruiter to join their Hardware Engineering team. This role focuses on NPI/EPE activities, driving products from design to volume manufacturing while collaborating with various teams. Candidates should possess a strong background in electrical engineering and experience in high-tech manufacturing processes.

Benefits

Medical insurance

Vision insurance

401(k)

Paid paternity leave

Paid maternity leave

Child care support

Pension plan

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in NPI/EPE roles.
• Strong academic background in electrical engineering.
• Experience with off-shore contract manufacturers.

Responsibilities

• Own manufacturing NPI/EPE activities, ensuring successful product transition from design to volume manufacturing.
• Manage PCBA BOM structuring and risk assessment.
• Collaborate with cross-functional partners on developing Contract Manufacturer capabilities.

Skills

NPI activities

Product development lifecycle

Manufacturing processes

Debugging

Education

Bachelor’s in Electrical Engineering

Tools

PLM tools

EE design tools

Job description

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Senior Technical Recruiter @ Astera Labs | Licensed Talent Advisor

As an Astera Labs New Product Introduction (NPI) / Electrical Product (EPE) Engineer, you will be part of a Hardware Engineering team that designs and manufactures products featuring Astera Labs’ portfolio of connectivity ASICs used in the world’s leading cloud service providers, server, and network OEMs. In this role, you will be responsible for NPI—taking products from the design stage to volume manufacturing. You will work closely with designers, manufacturing teams, suppliers, and contract manufacturers to ensure that hardware product test flows are properly introduced, released to manufacturing, and supported past production.

This role will also require engagement in activities such as Bill of Materials (BOM) management, Design for Manufacturability (DFM), validation, and process documentation. Additionally, the EPE is expected to drive continuous improvements in manufacturing test flow, product yield, and cost efficiency.

While your focus will be on NPI/EPE, you will have the opportunity (and be expected—depending on your experience) to contribute to adjacent areas such as test engineering, validation, and quality. Being part of a growing manufacturing team, we welcome the diverse experience you bring.

Key Responsibilities:

• Own manufacturing NPI/EPE activities, ensuring successful product transition from design to volume manufacturing.
• Manage PCBA BOM structuring and risk assessment to improve manufacturability and minimize changes late in the cycle.
• Lead BOM release through ECO and PLM tools, ensuring alignment with cross-functional teams.
• Analyze end-to-end manufacturing capacity and work with operations teams for future planning.
• Collaborate with cross-functional partners on developing Contract Manufacturer (CM) capabilities to prototype, launch, and transition products to high-volume production.
• Identify and mitigate contract manufacturer gaps in capabilities, process readiness, and documentation.
• Work with factory and engineering teams to troubleshoot failures, perform root cause analysis, and implement corrective actions.
• Participate in and help define key manufacturing processes, including NPI, product engineering, validation, and quality control.
• Drive improvements in SMT process flow, quality control, and inline inspections.
• Develop clear, precise manufacturing instructions, rework, and deviation documentation.
• Work cross-functionally to understand and resolve issues throughout product lifecycle with emphasis in hardware design and manufacturing.

Basic Qualifications;

• 5+ years of experience in NPI/EPE roles.
• Strong academic and technical background in electrical engineering or electronic manufacturing. Bachelor’s in EE or equivalent experience required.
• Minimum of 5 years’ experience in test engineering or electronics manufacturing.
• Entrepreneurial, open-minded behavior with a strong "customer-first" mindset.
• Ability to travel to CMs as needed to support production ramp-up and troubleshooting.

Required Experience:

• Strong understanding of high-tech manufacturing processes, NPI activities, and product development lifecycle.
• Experience working with off-shore contract manufacturers.
• Track record of successfully launching complex electronic products.
• Demonstrated ability to analyze and optimize manufacturing test data to improve yields and efficiency.
• Experience with DFM, Design for Testability (DFT), and Design for Assembly (DFA) methodologies.
• Bill of Material (BOM) structuring and risk management experience with PLM tools (e.g., Arena, Agile).
• Strong debugging experience for hardware design and production failures.
• Root cause analysis of contract manufacturing issues.
• Experience implementing process documentation and manufacturing best practices.

Preferred Experience:

• Familiarity with optical/electrical networking module manufacturing and testing (e.g., SFP+, QSFP, OSFP), data center class products such as servers, network switches, modular chassis, and/or PCIe add-in cards
• SMT process improvement and quality control methodologies.
• Data analysis and reporting using Python.
• Ability to assess and close Contract Manufacturing gaps in capability.
• Proficiency with EE design tools, including schematic capture and PCB layout (Cadence, Altium, etc.).
• Technical writing experience for generating clear and precise manufacturing documentation.
• Exposure to ASIC/silicon development and hardware validation processes.

Seniority level

• Seniority level

  Mid-Senior level

Employment type

• Employment type

  Full-time

Job function

• Industries

  Semiconductor Manufacturing and Computer Hardware Manufacturing

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Inferred from the description for this job

Medical insurance

Vision insurance

401(k)

Paid paternity leave

Paid maternity leave

Child care support

Pension plan

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