Senior Robotics Manufacturing Engineer

Rocket Lab; Pasadena (CA); On-site; USD 95,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Rocket Lab Robotics in Pasadena, CA seeks a Senior Manufacturing Engineer I to lead development and continuous improvement of manufacturing technologies, build processes, tooling, and production systems for advanced robotics hardware.

You will collaborate with design engineering, production, quality, and supply chain to translate designs into efficient manufacturing workflows, drive root-cause analysis, and implement corrective actions across the production lifecycle.

Qualifications

• Experience translating designs into efficient, repeatable manufacturing processes.
• Ability to develop and implement tooling, fixtures, and test setups for robotic hardware.
• Strong problem-solving skills with hands-on, rapid iteration experience.

Responsibilities

• Plan and execute the build, integration, and test of robotics systems, electromechanical assemblies, tooling, fixtures, and related production hardware.
• Review fabrication and assembly documentation for flight and production hardware, providing manufacturability feedback to improve build efficiency, reduce risk, and optimize cost without compromising quality or performance.
• Develop concepts of operations, manufacturing plans, and build strategies for robotic mechanisms, automation equipment, and integrated modules.
• Design, develop, and drive build of production tooling, fixtures, handling equipment, and test setups that improve safety, quality, throughput, and repeatability.
• Develop build methods to increase throughput, reduce opportunities for error, simplify technician workflows, and improve manufacturability.
• Support robotics integration and production teams in developing and enabling day‑to‑day execution of assembly, inspection, repair/retrofit, integration, and system test procedures.
• Collect, document, and communicate lessons learned from builds to design engineering, manufacturing, quality, and production teams.
• Develop and maintain clear work instructions, travelers, test procedures, and visual aids to ensure effective communication between engineering and technicians.
• Oversee the creation, maintenance, and accuracy of production travelers and manufacturing documentation to ensure traceability, quality compliance, and efficient execution of manufacturing processes.
• Contribute to, develop, and own build procedures; document non‑conformances and translate findings into actionable process improvements.
• Maintain integrated planning and build documents that reflect current hardware configurations, work scope, priorities, and production readiness.
• Design and develop tools and hardware to enable robotics processing, assembly, checkout, and required

Skills

Manufacturing technologies

Build processes

Root-cause analysis

Documentation

Robotics assembly

Job description

Rocket Lab Robotics in Pasadena, CA seeks a Senior Manufacturing Engineer I to lead development and continuous improvement of manufacturing technologies, build processes, tooling, and production systems for advanced robotics hardware.

You will collaborate with design engineering, production, quality, and supply chain to translate designs into efficient manufacturing workflows, drive root-cause analysis, and implement corrective actions across the production lifecycle.