Senior Mechanical Controls Engineer

Lambda; United States; Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Lambda, The Superintelligence Cloud, is seeking a senior engineer to design and commission mechanical controls for large-scale AI data centers. You will own standards, develop sequences of operation, and specify automation for central cooling plants and related equipment.

Collaboration across mechanical, electrical, network, and commissioning teams is essential. The role demands experience with PLC, DDC, and BMS architectures, instrumentation, sensors, and safety interlocks, and a bachelor's

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in mechanical, electrical, controls, or systems.
• Experience designing or commissioning mechanical controls for data centers or mission-critical facilities.
• Understanding of chilled-water, condenser-water, heat-rejection, air-cooling and liquid-cooling systems.
• Experience with PLC, DDC and BMS architectures and common protocols (BACnet, Modbus, OPC UA).
• Ability to translate operational requirements into clear, testable control behavior.

Responsibilities

• Own controls standards and reference architectures for mechanical systems in large-scale AI data centers.
• Develop control narratives, sequences of operation, points lists, alarm matrices, and controller requirements.
• Define automation for central cooling plants, heat-rejection systems, pumps and related equipment.
• Design system behavior for startup, shutdown, maintenance, failures, and recovery.
• Coordinate controls requirements across mechanical, electrical, network, and operations teams.
• Support testing, commissioning, and site bring-up of cooling systems.

Skills

Mechanical controls

Control systems

Troubleshooting

Team communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in mechanical, electrical, controls, or systems

Tools

BACnet

Modbus

OPC UA

PLC / DDC / BMS

Job description

Lambda, The Superintelligence Cloud, is a leader in AI cloud infrastructure serving tens of thousands of customers. Our customers range from AI researchers to enterprises and hyperscalers. Lambda's mission is to make compute as ubiquitous as electricity and give everyone the power of superintelligence. One person, one GPU.If you'd like to build the world's best AI cloud, join us.

*Note: This position requires presence in our San Francisco or San Jose office location 4 days per week; Lambda’s designated work from home day is currently Tuesday.

What You’ll Do

• Own controls standards and reference architectures for mechanical systems supporting large-scale AI data centers.
• Develop control narratives, sequences of operation, points lists, alarm matrices, cause-and-effect diagrams, and controller requirements.
• Define automation for central cooling plants, heat-rejection systems, pumps, heat exchangers, CRAHs, CDUs, liquid-cooling loops, valves, and associated equipment.
• Design system behavior for startup, shutdown, maintenance, component failure, utility loss, and recovery.
• Establish requirements for sensors, actuators, meters, control panels, PLCs, DDC controllers, gateways, and operator interfaces.
• Define BMS integration, mechanical telemetry, trending, alarming, data retention, and interfaces with other operational systems.
• Review partner designs, vendor submittals, control drawings, network architectures, and equipment packages for compliance with Lambda standards.
• Coordinate controls requirements across mechanical, electrical, network, hardware, construction, commissioning, and operations teams.
• Support factory testing, site acceptance testing, commissioning, integrated systems testing, and cooling-system bring-up.
• Troubleshoot control-loop instability, sensor errors, communication failures, nuisance alarms, and sequence deficiencies.
• Incorporate commissioning results and operating lessons into future designs and control standards.
• Travel to project sites, manufacturers, and partner facilities as needed.

YouHave experience designing or commissioning mechanical controls for data centers, mission-critical facilities, central plants, or industrial environments.

• Understand chilled-water, condenser-water, heat-rejection, air-cooling, and liquid-cooling systems.
• Can develop and review sequences of operation, P IDs, control diagrams, wiring diagrams, points lists, and functional test procedures.
• Understand PLC, DDC, and BMS architectures and common protocols such as BACnet, Modbus, and OPC UA.
• Have experience with instrumentation, sensor selection, control loops, alarms, interlocks, and equipment safeties.
• Understand how mechanical systems should respond during equipment failures, power events, and changing thermal loads.
• Can translate operational requirements into clear, testable control behavior.
• Communicate effectively with engineers, programmers, vendors, commissioning teams, and facility operators.
• Hold a bachelor’s degree in mechanical, electrical, controls, or systems e