What are the responsibilities and job description for the Atlas Senior Mechanical Engineer position at Boston Dynamics?
Atlas is our next-generation humanoid robot, designed to perform useful work in dynamic, real-world environments. A central challenge in achieving this is the development of highly robust grippers that combine strength, dexterity, and high fidelity tactile sensing in compact packages.
We’re looking for a Senior Mechanical Engineer to contribute to the design and development of Atlas’s grippers. You’ll work on novel mechanisms and assemblies—balancing dexterity, force capability, manufacturability, and durability—while collaborating closely with multidisciplinary teams to deliver hardware that directly impacts Atlas’s ability to interact with the world.
Responsibilities
We’re looking for a Senior Mechanical Engineer to contribute to the design and development of Atlas’s grippers. You’ll work on novel mechanisms and assemblies—balancing dexterity, force capability, manufacturability, and durability—while collaborating closely with multidisciplinary teams to deliver hardware that directly impacts Atlas’s ability to interact with the world.
Responsibilities
- Contribute to the design of key gripper subsystems, from early concepts through to production-ready hardware.
- Develop and analyze mechanisms that balance dexterity, payload, and reliability under demanding use cases.
- Apply engineering fundamentals across materials, tribology, thermals, and tolerance stack-ups to achieve robust, repeatable performance.
- Use CAD (3DX/Catia) and analysis tools to model, simulate, and validate designs.
- Collaborate with electrical, controls, and manufacturing engineers to ensure clean integration and testability.
- Support prototyping, bring-up, and issue resolution throughout the product lifecycle.
- Have strong fundamentals in mechanics, dynamics, and materials, with a track record of building precision mechanisms.
- Are fluent in CAD and comfortable managing complex assemblies with tight packaging and motion constraints.
- Have experience with precision actuation hardware—such as tendon- or gear-driven systems, elastomeric contacts, or compliant joints.
- Are confident balancing competing requirements of performance, manufacturability, and reliability.
- B.S. in Mechanical Engineering or related field with 2 years of relevant experience, or an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering or related field.
- Experience designing and delivering hardware from concept through validation.
- Demonstrated ability to take ownership of mechanical designs in multidisciplinary projects.
