Founding Engineer Intern (Robotics Systems)
Waken Robotics
San Francisco Bay AreaFresher1d agovia LinkedIn
Posted 13 Nov 2026, 14:20 ET · Verified open on LinkedIn 14 Nov, 00:13 ET
This job at a glance
- Who can apply
- New grads and up to 1 year
- Must know
- Networking
- Work
- On-site in San Francisco Bay Area · internship
- Pay
- $25–$45 an hour
- Skill demand
- Networking13%of 100 similar entry-level jobs posted in the US this week
- Listed
- Nov 13, 2026 · still open
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About the Role
Waken Robotics is looking for a Founding Engineer Intern to help shape their first hardware setup and build the systems needed for factory deployment. This role offers the opportunity to work directly with the founders on a project from implementation through physical testing.
Key Responsibilities
- Hardware and integration: Choose and integrate robot arms, grippers, sensors, and fixtures.
- Controls and tools: Build control, calibration, and teleoperation tools for experiments and demonstrations.
- Manipulation: Develop and test strategies for wire handling and contact insertion; diagnose failures and make execution repeatable.
- Reliability and recovery: Implement failure detection, safe operating behavior, and recovery routines.
- Robot learning: Connect demonstrations and learned policies to execution on real hardware, and evaluate effectiveness.
- Deployment preparation: Understand factory processes and operator workflows, test against requirements, and improve the system for deployment.
Requirements & Tech Stack
- Experience building a robot, hacking together a hardware project, or training a policy and testing it on a real system.
- Comfortable moving between code and the workbench.
- Ability to explain experiments and outcomes, especially when issues arise.
Qualifications
- Showcase something you have built and made work (e.g., video, repository, write-up, or private walkthrough).
- Provide personal project ownership details.
- Confirm availability and suitability for on-site work in San Francisco.
Details
- Location: San Francisco, on-site
- Compensation: $25–$45/hour, depending on experience
- Hours: 40-60 hours/week
- Start Date & Duration: Ideally late November/early December 2026 through April/May 2027
- Housing: Potential for founders' house accommodation in SF (availability, costs, and arrangements to be discussed).
- Application: Send a video, repo, write-up, or offer a private walkthrough to [email protected]. Include personal project ownership, availability, and confirmation of SF on-site suitability.