Senior Applications Engineer

Detroit Manufacturing Systems

$90K — $130K *
Wixom, MI 48393In-Person
Manufacturing & Automotive
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 8-15 years of engineering experience, particularly on product/customer interactions
  • Background in mechanical, electrical, or systems engineering; strong preference for electromechanical products
  • Expertise in Design for Manufacturing (DFM) conversations
  • Proficiency in reading CAD, BOMs, and technical design documentation
  • Experience with contract manufacturers or Tier 1/2 suppliers
  • Comfortable operating in fast-paced, early-stage hardware environments
  • Strong communication skills for both technical and executive discussions

Responsibilities

  • Serve as the primary technical liaison for customers from onboarding to production
  • Lead engineering discussions for requirements gathering and DFM feedback
  • Translate customer designs into workable manufacturing plans
  • Oversee the 30-day new customer launch process as technical lead
  • Identify and address gaps between customer expectations and Kinetyc capabilities
  • Contribute to innovation initiatives that leverage customer insights
  • Present and demonstrate Kinetyc's technical capabilities during customer interactions

Benefits

  • Support for professional development and training
  • Flexible work environment and hours
  • Opportunities for innovation and input in product development
  • Collaborative team culture focused on customer success
  • Exposure to diverse engineering challenges in a fast-growing company
Full Job Description
What You'll Own
• Primary technical relationship with new and existing customers from onboarding through production
• Lead customer engineering conversations - requirements gathering, DFM feedback, systems integration discussions, and technical risk identification
• Bridge between customer product design and Kinetyc manufacturing engineering - translating CAD, BOM, and design packages into executable manufacturing plans
• Support the 30-day new customer launch process as the technical lead
• Identify and communicate gaps between customer expectations and Kinetyc capabilities - early, clearly, and with proposed solutions
• Contribute to FLEXembly™ and innovation initiatives where customer insight drives product development opportunities
• Represent Kinetyc's technical capability in customer-facing settings - presentations, site visits, design reviews

What You've Done
• 8-15 years of engineering experience with meaningful time on the product/customer side - you've been the person the customer calls, not just the person who builds
• Background in mechanical, electrical, or systems engineering; experience with electromechanical or complex assembled products strongly preferred
• Comfortable in DFM conversations - you can tell a customer what's not manufacturable and why, and offer a better path forward without losing the relationship
• Experience reading and interpreting CAD, BOMs, and technical design packages
• Worked in or with contract manufacturers, Tier 1/2 suppliers, or product development environments
• Familiar with the pace and ambiguity of early-stage or scaling hardware companies - you don't need a perfect spec to get started
• Strong communicator: equally effective in a technical design review and an executive business conversation

What Makes You Different
• You think in systems, not just parts - you understand how design decisions upstream affect manufacturability, cost, and schedule downstream
• You ask the uncomfortable question early instead of absorbing the problem late
• You treat customer relationships as long-term partnerships, not transactions
• You're organized enough to manage multiple customers in parallel without dropping the ball
• You take pride in being the person who makes complex things happen smoothly

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