Sustaining Engineer: Cross-Functional Lifecycle Lead

Cubic Corporation; Durham (NC); On-site; USD 106,000 - 114,000; Full time

Job summary

Cubic Corporation in Durham, NC, seeks a Sustaining Engineer to bridge Engineering, Purchasing, and Manufacturing across the product lifecycle. You will own sustaining activities, resolve production and supplier issues, and drive engineering changes with a focus on cost reduction and lead-time improvements.

The role requires a strong technical foundation, cross-functional collaboration, and the ability to manage ECNs/ECOs while maintaining rigorous documentation and processes. Eligible for U.S.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Materials Science, Manufacturing Engineering, or a related discipline.
• Ability to obtain or maintain a U.S. security clearance, if required for assigned programs.
• 3+ years of experience in sustaining engineering, manufacturing engineering, process engineering, product engineering, supplier engineering, or a related technical role.
• Experience working in a cross-functional manufacturing environment.
• Strong understanding of engineering drawings, specifications, bills of material, and engineering change-control processes.
• Demonstrated ability to troubleshoot technical and manufacturing issues using structured root-cause analysis.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, organization, and stakeholder-management skills.

Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary technical point of contact between Engineering and Purchasing/Strategic Sourcing.
• Review new and existing designs to identify sourcing risks, obsolescence concerns, manufacturability challenges, and sole-source dependencies.
• Provide technical guidance during supplier selection, qualification, and risk assessments.
• Own sustaining engineering activities for released products and established manufacturing processes.
• Investigate and resolve production issues, component shortages, supplier quality concerns, and field-return issues.
• Drive root-cause analysis and corrective and preventive actions associated with supplier and manufacturing issues.
• Support product transfers, process improvements, yield enhancement, and capacity expansion initiatives.
• Lead engineering change activities associated with materials, suppliers, processes, and product improvements.
• Evaluate the technical, quality, schedule, and cost impacts of proposed changes.
• Collaborate with Program Management, Manufacturing, Quality, and Supply Chain to ensure timely and effective implementation of ECNs/ECOs.
• Maintain accurate technical documentation, specifications, drawings, bills of material, and change records.
• Partner with Purchasing to develop mitigation strategies for high-risk, long-lead, custom, and single-source materials.
• Support supplier audits, technical reviews, capability assessments, and qualification efforts.
• Review supplier technical documentation, specifications, process controls, and manufacturing capabilities.
• Drive alternate-source qualification to improve supply chain resiliency and continuity.
• Identify cost-reduction opportunities through design optimization, supplier development, material substitution, and component standardization.
• Support value engineering initiatives and make-versus-buy analyses.
• Partner with sourcing teams to evaluate technical tradeoffs associated with supplier, material, or process changes.
• Analyze yield, scrap, supplier performance, quality trends, and manufacturing metrics; recommend actions to improve reliability, manufacturability, cost, and delivery.

Skills

Bachelor's degree

Cross-functional collaboration

Engineering drawings

Root-cause analysis

Communication skills

Security clearance

Education

Engineering degree

Tools

ERP/MRP systems

PLM systems

Quality management systems (AS9100/ISO 9001)

Job description

Cubic Corporation in Durham, NC, seeks a Sustaining Engineer to bridge Engineering, Purchasing, and Manufacturing across the product lifecycle. You will own sustaining activities, resolve production and supplier issues, and drive engineering changes with a focus on cost reduction and lead-time improvements.

The role requires a strong technical foundation, cross-functional collaboration, and the ability to manage ECNs/ECOs while maintaining rigorous documentation and processes. Eligible for U.S.