Senior Marine Systems Engineer — Field Deployments & Robotics

Ocean Power Technologies, Inc.; Richmond, Northern (CA, KY); Hybrid; USD 165,000 - 175,000; Full time

Job summary

Ocean Power Technologies, Inc. in Richmond, CA, is seeking a Sr. Systems Engineer to join our multidisciplinary team, advancing WAM-V autonomous surface vehicles and PowerBuoy systems.

This role emphasizes hands-on problem solving, system bring-up, testing, and field deployments in fast-paced prototyping environments. The Sr. Systems Engineer will mentor engineers, lead design reviews, and coordinate across hardware, software, and integration teams to achieve robust, field-ready platforms.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering required; Mechanical, Electrical, or Computer engineering preferred.
• 6+ years in complex electromechanical or robotics systems.
• Strong system-level understanding of hardware/software.
• Hands-on design, integration, debugging, and field testing experience.
• Ability to mentor engineers and support cross-functional collaboration.
• Willingness to participate in field deployments and sea trials.
• Eligibility for U.S. government security clearance (if required).
• Experience with embedded systems, controls, and real-time software.

Responsibilities

• Lead day-to-day technical execution across multidisciplinary engineering efforts to deliver reliable, field-ready systems.
• Support system integration, bring-up, debugging, and validation of WAM-V and PowerBuoy platforms.
• Contribute to engineering execution, planning, and resource allocation across multiple concurrent development efforts, prototype builds, and sea trials.
• Work on challenging technical problems involving electromechanical systems, communications, controls, and autonomous behaviors.
• Conduct design reviews and provide hands-on mentorship to engineers across disciplines.
• Collaborate with software architecture and systems integration teams for subsystem compatibility.
• Collaborate with the commercial team on development efforts and overall VoM for internal scope.
• Support prioritization, task coordination, and engineering execution with leadership.
• Assist with field testing, sea trials, and operational deployments.
• Establish engineering best practices, documentation standards, and development processes.
• Contribute to hiring and development of engineering staff.

Skills

System-level engineering

Mentoring engineers

Cross-functional collaboration

Robotics & autonomous systems

Field testing

Hardware-software integration

Embedded systems

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Engineering

Master’s degree in Engineering

Tools

CAD

Diagnostics tools

Simulation tools

Networking tools

Job description

Ocean Power Technologies, Inc. in Richmond, CA, is seeking a Sr. Systems Engineer to join our multidisciplinary team, advancing WAM-V autonomous surface vehicles and PowerBuoy systems.

This role emphasizes hands-on problem solving, system bring-up, testing, and field deployments in fast-paced prototyping environments. The Sr. Systems Engineer will mentor engineers, lead design reviews, and coordinate across hardware, software, and integration teams to achieve robust, field-ready platforms.