Director Production Engineering

Lam Research•Fremont, CA

8d•Onsite

About The Position

The Customer Support Business Group focuses on enabling our customers with premier customer support throughout their lifecycle with Lam. We drive performance, productivity, safety, and quality of customers installed base performance and deliver service and lifecycle solutions for their most critical equipment and processes.

Requirements

Excellent leadership, communication, and project management skills.
An Engineering degree or foreign equivalent in Robotics, Mechatronics, Systems Engineering, or a related field and 10+ years of experience in Engineering.
15+ years of relevant experience; or 12 years with a Master’s degree; or 8 years with a PhD.
8+ years of management experience, including 5+ years leading Engineering teams to design/build Robotic/Automation related products or systems.
3+ years of experience working in the semiconductor industry on global programs or projects.
3+ years of experience working with technology companies for new product development.
Strong background in physical AI, robotics, automation, and algorithm development.
Ability to work onsite in a robotics lab environment and lead cross-functional initiatives.
International travel required up to 10%.

Nice To Haves

Proficiency in Python, SQL, OpenCV, and machine learning frameworks such as TensorFlow or PyTorch a major benefit.
Experience with MCAD tools (e.g., Siemens NX, Creo, SolidWorks).

Responsibilities

Directs, leads, and manages the technical activities of a hardware development function for electronic design, mechanical design and/or hardware reliability.
Directs, leads, and manages the technical activities of a software development function for software systems, applications and/or software quality assurance.
Directs, leads, and manages the technical activities of an integrated hardware/software systems design function.
Interfacing with Product Management, Program Management, Pilot Operations, Supply Chain, to deliver customer‑facing Dextro™ robotic and automation products to Lam’s customers.
Design, lead, and manage Dextro™ Production Engineering from Alpha builds through customer shipments and field sustainment.
Works closely with Dextro™ R&D Engineering and Dextro Operations to ensure rapid product development, industrialization, and release using Lam’s PDR scalable framework, with accountability for quality, reliability, and repeatability in the field.
Own end‑to‑end engineering execution for production robotic systems.
Review and approve Vision Documents, MRS, system architectures, engineering concepts, detailed designs, and final product solutions.
Translate product requirements into executable engineering plans with clear achievable schedules, resource allocations, dependencies, and technical ownership.
Identify system‑level, design, lab, supplier, and execution risks.
Develop mitigation strategies to ensure functional capability, reliability growth, and production readiness.
Utilize Program Management rigor to track progress, manage changes, resolve tradeoffs, and ensure all engineering documentation meets Lam PDR and release requirements.
Organize, lead, and facilitate direct reports and cross‑functional teams to execute new Dextro™ product programs under Lam production product constraints.
Serve as engineering owner of system‑level product behavior, including theory‑of‑operation, interfaces, failure modes, serviceability, and lifecycle performance.
Address gaps highlighted in annual ORG Audits by enforcing strong engineering discipline within production engineering teams.
Ensure CAD quality, design consistency, documentation completeness, and test coverage meet expectations for customer‑released products.
Lead root‑cause analysis and corrective actions for T3 field issues and escalations, ensuring learnings are engineered back into the product design and future releases.
Develop and maintain established engineering metrics tied to product readiness, design quality, cycle time, reliability, and execution stability.
Use data to identify recurring inefficiencies across design, validation, lab usage, and release workflows.
Partner with CSBG Engineering operations to drive continuous improvement, automation, and transparency in execution.
Utilize analytical techniques to provide actionable, fact‑based insights and recommendations to senior management on product health, risks, and improvement opportunities.
Communicate effectively with executive leadership and functional partners across CSBG, Product Groups, and Operations.
Present complex robotic system topics clearly and concisely to support decisions on customer commitments, roadmap timing, investment tradeoffs, and scale‑up readiness.
Build trusted relationships that enable fast alignment and decisive execution across a highly matrixed organization.
Lead, coach, and develop multidisciplinary engineering teams spanning mechanical, electrical, controls, software, computer vision, and systems engineering.
Set clear goals, ownership expectations, and performance standards aligned to product delivery and field outcomes.
Foster collaboration, inclusion, and shared accountability across global and offshore teams.
Build organizational capability, effectiveness, and bench strength through deliberate talent development, role clarity, and succession planning to support sustained Dextro™ growth.