Mechanical Lead, R&D
Lead mechanical engineering R&D for cooling, piping, and mechanical systems in modular data centers and power infrastructure. Own reference designs, enforce technical standards, review vendor packages, and grow the team while solving the hardest problems.
About the job
Role Scope
- Lead mechanical engineering for R&D: cooling, piping, and mechanical plant for modular units and behind-the-meter systems.
- Own the mechanical reference designs: released, revision-controlled, and defensible to the megawatt.
- Set the technical bar: calcs checked, standards enforced, and vendor packages reviewed for real.
- Grow the team: hire, mentor, and delegate while carrying the hardest problems.
Requirements
- Led mechanical design for data centers, power plants, or heavy industrial systems.
- Released mechanical packages that got built at scale.
- Check calcs personally and catch what juniors miss.
- Qualified major mechanical equipment with vendors.
- Balance innovation against the schedule that ships.
Nice-to-Haves
- Liquid cooling depth.
- Chilled water plants.
- PE license.
- Modular construction.
Skills
Mechanical Design, Data Center Cooling, Piping Systems, Chilled Water Plants, Liquid Cooling, Mechanical Engineering Calculations, Vendor Qualification, Modular Construction, Pe License
Similar jobs
Hardware Engineering jobs
Anthropic
San Francisco, CADesigns, programs, commissions, and operates enterprise audiovisual systems for offices, conference rooms, events, and broadcasts. The role requires 8+ years of enterprise AV experience, Q-Sys or similar control programming expertise, technical drawing skills, and strong integrated-system troubleshooting ability.
Fluidstack
Austin, TXTechnical leader owning compute qualification, first-silicon and new-platform validation, test automation, and root-cause failure analysis for AI compute infrastructure. Requires senior hardware validation or systems engineering experience with early hardware qualification and automation ownership.
OpenAI
San Francisco, CA
Senior physical design specialist supporting semiconductor customer engagements, AI-assisted chip-design solutions, and broader forward-deployed engineering delivery. Requires deep ASIC/SoC backend implementation expertise, tapeout experience, EDA fluency, and at least 7 years with a bachelor’s degree or 5 years with a master’s.
OpenAI
San Francisco, CA
Designs and releases high-density, multilayer PCBs for next-generation robotic systems, coordinating with electrical, mechanical, signal-integrity, power-integrity, and manufacturing teams. Requires 6+ years of complex PCB design experience and strong Cadence Allegro expertise.
Anthropic
San Francisco, CA
Leads Anthropic’s global data center hardware repair program, owning repair SLAs, backlog, RMAs, spares, vendor performance, and return-to-service outcomes across multiple sites. Requires 8+ years of data center operations experience, hardware expertise, and strong vendor and process-management skills.