Senior Applications Eng Manager at Standard Bots

Standard Bots; United States; Remote; USD 140.000 - 180.000; Vollzeit

Benefits dieser Stelle

Employee stock options

Medical/dental/vision insurance

401(k) plan with company match

Zusammenfassung

Standard Bots seeks a Senior Applications Engineering Manager who combines hands-on automation skills with people leadership. You will guide a regional AE team, stay hands-on on robot programming and PLC work, and drive successful customer engagements.

You'll travel up to 25% domestically, report to the VP, and help scale processes, playbooks, and training materials while partnering with sales and product teams.

Qualifikationen

• 5+ years of hands-on applications engineering, systems integration, or automation engineering.
• 2+ years of people management or team lead experience.
• Strong customer-facing presence with ability to manage escalations.
• Experience leading distributed teams across a territory.
• Willingness to travel up to 25% domestically.

Aufgaben

• Manage and develop a team of Applications Engineers across your territory.
• Own capacity planning and workload distribution for your team.
• Set the technical and cultural standard for the group.
• Conduct regular 1:1s, performance conversations, and development planning.
• Own the applications engineering function from pre-sales to post-install success.
• Be the senior escalation point for complex integrations and customer situations.
• Travel to customer sites up to 25% for escalations and key installs.

Kenntnisse

PLC programming

Ladder logic

Pneumatics

Robot programming

Python scripting

CAD

People management

Customer-facing

Distributed team leadership

Domestic travel readiness

Ausbildung

Bachelor's degree in Mechanical, Electrical, Mechatronics, or related engineering

Tools

UR/FANUC/KUKA/ABB robots

Jobbeschreibung

Senior Applications Eng Manager at Standard Bots — Remote

This role sits at the intersection of senior individual contributor and people leadership — a "player-coach" position that is increasingly valued in high-growth hardware and robotics companies. It's a strong career move for experienced automation engineers ready to transition into management without fully leaving the technical side.

Compensation context: The $140K–$180K base is competitive for a senior engineering manager in industrial automation, especially with equity (stock options) and full benefits. Market benchmarks for Applications Engineering Managers in the U.S. typically range from $130K–$190K depending on region and industry segment — Standard Bots is well within range and the equity upside is a meaningful differentiator at a growth-stage company.

• People management and distributed team leadership — highly transferable across industries.
• Deep robotics and automation expertise (PLC, cobot platforms, vision systems) — a hot skill set as manufacturing automation accelerates.
• Cross-functional collaboration with sales and product teams — builds commercial acumen rare among engineers.
• Scalable process building (playbooks, training, standards) — valued at any company scaling a field engineering org.

Green flags: Standard Bots is the largest U.S. industrial robotics company by units shipped, with notable clients (NASA, Lockheed Martin). Early-stage equity at a company with real traction is meaningful. The VP reporting line suggests direct leadership visibility.

Watch for: The "player-coach" framing can blur into an unsustainable workload if headcount grows faster than expected. Clarify team size and growth plans in interviews.

Standard Bots is building the next generation of industrial robots — hardware that's powerful, affordable, and designed to scale. We're the largest U.S. industrial robotics company by robots shipped, and our robots are showing up on factory floors everywhere from independent machine shops to NASA and Lockheed Martin. Someone has to make sure those robots actually work — and someone has to build the team that makes that happen at scale. That's this role.

Note: This role requires up to 25% domestic travel. You're still in the field — just not living out of a suitcase 2–3 days a week.

Also note: Like every Applications Engineer at Standard Bots, this is not a software engineering role. You are a hands-on industrial automation engineer who also happens to lead people. If you've never commissioned a robotic cell, this isn't the right seat.

The Role

The Applications Engineering Manager is a player-coach. You still know your way around a factory floor — fixtures, I/O, ladder logic, robot programming, all the things — and you use that expertise every day, both to stay sharp and to earn the respect of the team you're leading.

You'll manage a team of Applications Engineers across your territory, owning their development, their workload, and the quality of every customer engagement they touch. You'll be the escalation point when installs get complicated, the person who jumps on a plane when a customer situation needs senior eyes, and the one who sets the standard for what great applications engineering looks like at Standard Bots.

This is still a hands-on role. You're not managing from a desk. You're leading from the front. You'll report directly to the VP of Applications Engineering.

What You'll Do

• Manage and develop a team of Applications Engineers across your territory — setting expectations, coaching on technical and customer-facing skills, and building a team that executes at a high level.
• Own capacity planning and workload distribution across your team — making sure the right engineer is on the right job and nobody is drowning.
• Be the technical and cultural standard-setter for your team; the bar you hold yourself to is the bar your team rises to.
• Conduct regular 1:1s, performance conversations, and development planning — you invest in your people's growth, not just their output.

Territory & Customer Ownership

• Own the applications engineering function for your territory — from pre-sales POC support through post-install customer success.
• Serve as the senior technical escalation point for complex integrations, difficult customer situations, or installs that aren't going as planned.
• Partner closely with your Regional Sales Manager on territory priorities, pipeline, and customer strategy — you're the technical counterpart to their commercial leadership.
• Maintain strong relationships with key customer accounts in your territory; they should know you by name and trust your judgment.

Hands-On Technical Work

• Stay sharp and stay in it — you're still designing solutions, reviewing integrations, commissioning cells, and supporting installs when the situation calls for it.
• Lead or co-lead technically complex or strategically important customer engagements yourself.
• Review and sign off on solution designs, POCs, and integration plans produced by your team.
• Travel to customer sites as needed — up to 25% domestically — for escalations, key installs, and customer relationship moments.
• Define and enforce the standard for how applications engineering work gets done in your territory — documentation, handoffs, commissioning checklists, customer training quality.
• Feed territory-level learnings back to the broader applications engineering organization and to product and engineering teams.
• Help build the playbooks, templates, and training materials that make every AE on your team better and every deployment more repeatable.

What We're Looking For

• Genuine fluency across mechanical, electrical, and software: PLC programming and ladder logic, pneumatics, DC power systems, robot programming, Python scripting, CAD.
• 5+ years of hands-on applications engineering, systems integration, or automation engineering experience — you've done the field work and done it well.
• 2+ years of people management or team lead experience — you've led engineers, given hard feedback, and helped someone grow.
• Strong customer-facing presence — you can manage a difficult customer conversation, set expectations clearly, and represent Standard Bots credibly at a senior level.
• Experience managing a distributed team or territory; you know how to lead people you don't see every day.
• Comfort with up to 25% domestic travel for escalations, key customer engagements, and team support.
• Bachelor's degree in Mechanical, Electrical, Mechatronics, or a related engineering discipline — or equivalent hands-on experience that tells the same story.

Nice to Have

• Prior experience with collaborative robots (UR, Fanuc, KUKA, ABB, or similar).
• Background scaling an applications engineering or field engineering function — you've helped build something, not just inherited it.
• Experience with vision systems, force/torque sensing, or custom end-of-arm tooling.
• Familiarity with machine tending, palletizing, welding, or assembly automation applications.

Compensation and Benefits

The salary range for this role is $140,000 to $180,000, depending on experience. We are open to a variety of seniority levels for this role and will build compensation packages that are commensurate with seniority and skill level. Base salary is just one part of the overall compensation at Standard Bots. All full-time employees are eligible for Employee Stock Options. We also offer a package of benefits including paid time off, medical/dental/vision insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, and 401(k) to regular full-time employees.

Is the Applications Engineering Manager role fully remote or office-based? The role appears to be home-based within the U.S., with up to 25% domestic travel required for customer site visits, escalations, and key installations. No fixed office location is specified in the job posting. What is the salary range for this position? The base salary ranges from $140,000 to $180,000 depending on experience and seniority. In addition to base pay, all full-time employees are eligible for stock options, paid time off, medical/dental/vision insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, and a 401(k). Do I need prior management experience to apply? Yes — Standard Bots requires a minimum of 2 years of people management or team lead experience, including giving feedback and supporting engineer development. Is this a software engineering role? No. This is a hands-on industrial automation engineering role with people management responsibilities. Candidates must have experience commissioning robotic cells and working with PLC programming, pneumatics, robot programming, and related hardware. What types of robots or automation systems will I work with? You'll work with Standard Bots' own industrial robots deployed in factory environments. Familiarity with collaborative robot platforms (UR, Fanuc, KUKA, ABB) is listed as a nice-to-have, as is experience with vision systems, force/torque sensing, and end-of-arm tooling.

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