Hardware Engineer
Required skills
- hardware
- mechanical design
- electronics
- field hardware
- qualification
- install kits
- washdowns
- cold
- salt spray
- vibration
Nice to have
- marine hardware
- subsea hardware
- food-grade washdown
- machine shops
- suppliers
- drawings
Role summary
OctaPulse is seeking a Hardware Engineer to design and qualify field-ready hardware for aquaculture environments. This role involves creating reliable, repeatable systems that can withstand harsh conditions like washdowns, salt spray, and cold. The engineer will transition designs from prototype to released products, ensuring dependability and ease of setup. Responsibilities include addressing challenges with measuring wet, reflective fish and developing repeatable install kits. This is an on-site position in Dallas (Frisco area) with up to 25% travel to farms and processing plants. The ideal candidate has experience in either mechanical design for harsh environments or electronics, with the ability to learn the other quickly.
OctaPulse builds computer vision and robotics for aquaculture. Fish farming is one of the fastest-growing food production systems on the planet, but its most important checks still depend on people with nets, calipers and clipboards. Our vision systems help farms see every fish and record what happens on the line.
That hardware lives in bad places: daily washdowns, salt spray, cold, vibration and remote sites.
You will turn that into hardware we can trust and repeat: qualified designs, reliable field hardware and install kits we can ship to a new site. This is not a lab role. We care about hardware that keeps working when nobody from OctaPulse is standing next to it.
This is an early engineering hire under our CTO, on-site in Dallas (Frisco area) with up to 20 to 25% travel to farms and processing sites. Very few people are strong at all of this. If you are strong in either mechanical design for harsh environments or electronics and can learn the other fast, apply.
## What you'll build
- **Field-ready hardware, qualified.** Take our designs from prototype to a released product that survives harsh, wet environments, and prove it with a real test campaign rather than hope.
- **Reliable hardware in the field.** Make our hardware dependable and easy to set up and maintain, wherever it is installed.
- **Measuring wet, shiny fish.** Help our vision hardware see wet, reflective, moving animals clearly and consistently, and characterize how it behaves on the real thing.
- **Repeatable install kits.** Make installs repeatable, with clear documentation. Work with machine shops and suppliers to get parts made right. Then go on site, install them and learn what breaks.
## You might be
- Someone who has shipped hardware that lives outside a lab: outdoors, in a plant, on a vehicle or at sea.
- Comfortable with mechanical design for sealing and harsh environments.
- Comfortable with electronics for reliable field hardware.
- Good with power, cabling, connectors and grounding.
- Methodical about testing. You write the qualification plan and then actually run it.
- Willing to travel up to 20 to 25% of the time to farms and processing plants, and fine with cold, wet and loud.
- Able to work on-site in Dallas, TX (Frisco area).
## Bonus
- Marine, subsea or food-grade washdown hardware experience.
- Experience working with machine shops and suppliers on drawings, quotes and inspection.
## Details
**Location:** Dallas, TX (Frisco area)
**Workplace:** On-site
**Type:** Full-time
**Compensation:** $120k to $145k + equity
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