Controls Engineer Jobs

About The Position

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical, Electronic, Controls, Automation or Mechatronics Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent demonstrable experience.
• Typically 8+ years of hands-on industrial controls engineering experience in manufacturing, including delivery on capital equipment programmes.
• Strong PLC programming and diagnostic capability across at least one major platform (Siemens TIA Portal/S7, Rockwell/Allen-Bradley Studio 5000, or equivalent), plus HMI and SCADA experience.
• Demonstrable hands-on experience integrating machine vision or camera-based inspection systems with controls — capture triggers, part-present and cycle signals, lighting control, reject handling and station interlocks.
• Solid grasp of industrial networking and protocols — Profinet, Ethernet/IP, OPC-UA, Modbus — and of plant network architecture.
• Hands-on experience moving plant-floor data into applications and platforms using MQTT and structured message formats such as JSON, including configuration of industrial middleware or integration tooling — for example DeviceWise, Node-RED, Ford crossPLC, HiveMQ or equivalent.
• Ability to read, review and approve electrical, pneumatic and hydraulic drawings and control panel designs.
• Practical experience of machine build, run-off, installation and commissioning, including issue resolution under launch pressure.
• Demonstrated experience applying, governing or authoring engineering standards and specifications, and handling deviation and waiver decisions.
• Working knowledge of OT cybersecurity requirements for plant-floor compute across both Windows and Linux-based systems — segregation, hardening, patching and access control.
• Strong safety discipline on live manufacturing equipment, including lockout (ECPL), permits, risk assessment and machine safety requirements.
• Demonstrable experience mentoring engineers and influencing without authority across engineering, plant, IT and supplier stakeholders.
• Willingness and ability to travel internationally to plants, OEMs and equipment run-off.
• Fluent professional English.

Nice To Haves

• Master's degree in a controls, automation or systems engineering discipline.
• Familiarity with Ford controls standards and systems — FAST, OMS, MIDAS, OPIC, OneSpot, GPDS, QWX, WMA, QLS-CM, M/FIS.
• Experience of Virtual Commissioning tooling and practice.
• Experience deploying industrial PCs, DXD, edge compute and sensor instrumentation into live production environments.
• Experience integrating AI/ML, condition monitoring, gauging or quality systems with controls.
• Experience of energy monitoring and reduction initiatives on new and retool programmes.
• Additional European language (Spanish or German).

Responsibilities

• Support the ATP Core Industrial Controls team in the implementation of FAST and OMS standards for Sight-related programme engineering activity, and ensure alignment with the global Bill of Process (BOP) and Bill of Design (BOD).
• Own and administer the controls-related procedures and specifications applying to Sight products, keeping them current, proportionate and usable.
• Review programme deviations and waiver requests from OEMs and plants against FAST and OMS, and provide practical guidance towards compliant solutions.
• Represent the Sight Vertical on relevant subcommittees, and support global supplier follow-up, communication and feedback.
• Monitor the use of structured software specifications, and support GDME-led training for plant teams and OEMs so code is consistent and maintainable.
• Define the standard controls interface patterns by which Sense and Vision products acquire data and return outputs — tag and data-array structures, handshakes, event and polled acquisition, image capture triggers, part-present and cycle signals, reject handling and interlocks, and HMI interaction.
• Specify controls and instrumentation requirements for new and retooled equipment so that monitoring and inspection capability is designed in at source rather than retrofitted, working with programme teams and OEMs — including camera mounting provision, lighting supply and network drops for Vision products.
• Provide senior controls expertise to complex or first-of-type deployments, including legacy equipment with limited instrumentation, no camera provision or constrained networks.
• Conduct programme approvals and detailed review of electrical, pneumatic and hydraulic drawings, and participate in equipment PROTAG reviews, follow-ups and sign-off.
• Lead controls issue resolution during product, installation and commissioning, and support fresh-eyes reviews on other programmes.
• Lead and support Virtual Commissioning of controls software for Sight-related systems with GME and OEMs, validating logic virtually to protect timing.
• Enable the plant-floor data flows Sight products depend on — MES and IIoT interfaces such as FIS, QWX, WMA, QTS/QLS-CM and equivalent systems — including the middleware and message layer that carries data from controls to platform, using MQTT, structured payloads such as JSON, and tooling including DeviceWise, Node-RED, Ford’s crossPLC and HiveMQ.
• Identify power drop and electrical infrastructure requirements for Sight hardware with facilities teams, ensuring correct sizing and connection provision.
• Support and evidence cybersecurity compliance for CPN, MPN and non-OA plant-floor PCs used by Sight products, including industrial PCs, DXD, edge compute and GPU inference nodes.
• Implement and govern OT security protocols across both Windows and Linux-based plant-floor systems — hardening, patching, network segregation, remote access and identity — protecting manufacturing assets while keeping products operable.
• Act as the primary technical liaison with IT to resolve interface issues and ensure reliable connectivity between shop-floor hardware and enterprise systems.
• Coordinate and communicate cybersecurity updates and issues affecting Sight deployments, and make compliance status visible.
• Support the global controls obsolescence effort, maintaining a structured migration path for legacy automation and plant-floor compute hardware that Sight products depend on.
• Reduce controls engineering effort per deployment by developing reusable standard programmes, function blocks, configuration templates and acceptance criteria.
• Support product strategies and specifications, and provide cost inputs into product P&Ls where controls scope is required.
• Support plants with troubleshooting and resolution of production-related downtime associated with Sight products — PLC programmes, HMI screens, network and device faults.
• Coach the Product Launch and Deployment Engineer and software engineers in controls fundamentals, plant realities and safe working practice.
• Build and share reusable technical guidance — standards, Single Point Lessons, reference programmes and commissioning checklists.
• Actively reduce single-person dependency, ensuring controls knowledge critical to Sight products is documented and held by more than one person.
• Bring plant and controls reality into product discovery and architecture decisions early, so designs are deployable before they are committed.