Product Development Engineer - Mass Timber Hardware

MTC Solutions designs, tests, and supplies structural hardware for commercial timber and mass timber construction. Our products include screws, beam hangers, connectors, and connection systems that help engineers and builders connect large timber components safely, efficiently, and reliably.

The Product Development Engineer is part of MTC Solutions' Research & Development team, the group responsible for developing new connection technologies and generating the physical test data required to bring them to market. When we talk about technical data, we mean testing real components, fasteners, prototypes, and connection systems in a laboratory environment, then turning the results into practical engineering decisions.

This is a hands-on engineering role for someone who enjoys open-ended technical problems and wants to create practical products, not simply analyze existing ones. You will work across the full product-development cycle: understanding the need, developing concepts, considering manufacturing and installation constraints, prototyping, physically supporting testing, analyzing results, and refining the design based on what you learn.

The ideal candidate is technically curious, creative, cost-aware, and practical. You can capture many parameters and variables - strength, stiffness, geometry, wood behaviour, installation, fire performance, manufacturing cost, quality control, and market need - and turn them into efficient hardware that can actually be manufactured and used on real projects.

What You'll Do

• New product development: Develop new structural connection products and improvements to existing MTC hardware from early concept through technical validation.
• Concept development: Translate market needs, installation challenges, structural requirements, and manufacturing constraints into practical product concepts.
• Engineering analysis: Perform calculations and analytical work to understand structural behaviour, compare concepts, define design requirements, and support product decisions.
• Prototyping: Develop CAD models, drawings, prototypes, test fixtures, and other materials required to evaluate and iterate new concepts.
• Hands-on testing: Participate directly in physical research work, including preparing specimens, moving timber components, installing prototypes, setting up fixtures, supporting lab testing, and reviewing failure modes.
• Test planning and validation: Develop test plans, coordinate specimen preparation and instrumentation, execute or support testing, and analyze test results.
• Design iteration: Use test results, engineering analysis, constructability, manufacturability, installation requirements, and field feedback to refine product designs.
• Research: Investigate new connection concepts, materials, testing methods, standards, approval pathways, and technologies relevant to mass timber construction.
• Project ownership: Plan and drive assigned R&D projects from initial concept through testing and technical validation, coordinating priorities, schedules, budgets, internal contributors, and external partners as required.
• Technical documentation: Clearly document assumptions, methodologies, calculations, test results, design decisions, revisions, and project conclusions.
• Cross-functional collaboration: Work closely with Product Application Engineering, Technical Service, Business Development, Operations, manufacturers, research laboratories, universities, and other external partners.

Who You Are

• You are an engineer who likes to invent, build, test, and improve things.
• You are comfortable when the answer is not obvious at the beginning, and you can move from uncertainty to a defensible technical recommendation.
• You enjoy physical products and testing, but you are also comfortable with calculations, technical documentation, and project planning.
• You can balance technical ambition with practical judgment, manufacturability, cost, quality control, and installation reality.
• You take ownership and are motivated by seeing an idea progress from a rough concept to a validated product that can be used in the field.

Preferred Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Civil, Structural, Timber, Mechanical Engineering, or another relevant engineering discipline.
• Professional Engineer (P.Eng.) designation, or EIT able to apply for P.Eng. in the near term.
• 3-8 years of relevant engineering, product-development, structural design, testing, or applied research experience preferred; exceptional candidates outside this range will also be considered.
• Strong understanding of mechanics, structural behaviour, materials, and engineering fundamentals.
• Experience in timber engineering, structural connections, fasteners, mass timber, or building products is strongly preferred.
• Experience with physical testing, prototyping, laboratory research, product validation, or experimental engineering is considered a strong asset.
• Experience with CAD and engineering analysis tools.
• Demonstrated ability to take ownership of technical projects, make engineering recommendations, and move open-ended problems toward practical solutions.
• Strong project management, communication, technical writing, and organizational skills.
• Ability to work independently while collaborating effectively with engineers, technologists, Operations, suppliers, and external research partners.
• Proficiency in English required.

Why This Role Matters

• MTC's ability to grow depends on continuously developing technical solutions that solve real problems for the mass timber industry. As a Product Development Engineer, you help turn those problems into products. The concepts you develop, tests you support, and engineering decisions you make will directly influence MTC's future product portfolio and competitive position.