Must be located near the Bay Area, with reliable transport to San Francisco, CA.
About Us
We are a well-capitalized stealth startup building robotic foundation models and world models for Physical AI. Founded by researchers from leading AI labs, our team works across robot hardware, data, infrastructure, and machine learning.
The Role
We are looking for a hands-on Robotics Systems Engineer to build and operate the robotic platforms behind our research.
You will work across hardware, embedded systems, robot software, communications, calibration, data collection, evaluation, and deployment. This role is broader than mechatronics: you should be comfortable debugging the complete system, from sensors and actuators, close loop control, and learned-policy evaluation.
Responsibilities
Bring up, integrate, and maintain humanoids, robotic arms, and custom platforms.
Debug mechanical, electrical, networking, communication, and software failures.
Integrate and help design sensors, actuators, motor controllers, embedded devices, compute, wiring, and power systems.
Develop robot drivers, hardware interfaces, diagnostics, and automation in Python or C++.
Build distributed robotics software using ROS, ROS 2, ZMQ, and related technologies.
Maintain teleoperation, robot data collection, dataset validation, and policy-evaluation software.
Perform calibration, functional testing, reliability testing, and performance characterization.
Develop logging, monitoring, health checks, and fault-recovery tools.
Work with ML researchers to deploy and evaluate learned policies on physical robots.
Improve system reliability, performance, safety, and maintainability.
Use AI coding agents to accelerate implementation, testing, debugging, and documentation.
Qualifications
BS or MS in Robotics, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Mechatronics, Computer Science, or a related field.
Experience integrating or operating complete robotic systems.
Proficiency with Linux, Git, and Python or C++.
Familiarity with ROS, ROS2, ZMQ or similar communication frameworks.
Familiarity with sensors, actuators, embedded electronics, networking, and robot system design.
Understanding of robot-learning workflows and their hardware and electronics requirements.
Experience with robot data collection or evaluation software.
Strong cross-stack debugging and problem-solving skills.
Experience using AI coding agents such as Claude Code, Codex, or comparable tools, including reviewing and validating generated code.
Comfortable working in a fast-moving environment and taking ownership of ambiguous problems.
Nice to Have
Experience with humanoids, manipulators, quadrupeds, or mobile robots.
Experience with teleoperation or learned-policy deployment.
Familiarity with CAN, EtherCAT, DDS, SPI, UART, or real-time systems.
Embedded programming experience with STM32, ESP32, Raspberry Pi, Jetson, or similar platforms.
Experience with camera, tactile, force-torque, encoder, or IMU integration and calibration.
Familiarity with multimodal data synchronization, experiment tracking, and robotics evaluation metrics.
CAD, machining, wiring, soldering, or rapid-prototyping experience.
What You Will Gain
Build advanced robots alongside experienced AI researchers and roboticists.
Work across the complete robot-learning stack, from hardware to foundation models.
Help shape the systems and engineering practices of an early-stage robotics company.
Hiring Process
Introductory conversation
Technical interview
One-day on-site assessment (paid at $40/hr).
Initial six-month contract with strong potential for a longer-term opportunity.
Logistics & Benefits
Location: San Francisco, CA (South Beach/SoMa) — on-site 5 days a week
Schedule: Full-time, 40 hours/week, including a 30-minute lunch break
Employment: W-2, facilitated through Hire.io
Compensation: $40+/hour, negotiable based on experience
Skills Required
- Bachelor’s or master’s degree in Robotics, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Mechatronics, Computer Science, or a related field
- Experience integrating or operating complete robotic systems
- Proficiency with Linux and Git
- Proficiency with Python or C++
- Familiarity with ROS, ROS 2, ZMQ, or similar communication frameworks
- Familiarity with sensors, actuators, embedded electronics, networking, and robot system design
- Understanding of robot-learning workflows and hardware and electronics requirements
- Experience with robot data collection or evaluation software
- Strong cross-stack debugging and problem-solving skills
- Experience using AI coding agents such as Claude Code, Codex, or comparable tools, including reviewing and validating generated code
- Ability to work in a fast-moving environment and take ownership of ambiguous problems
- Experience with humanoids, manipulators, quadrupeds, or mobile robots
- Experience with teleoperation or learned-policy deployment
- Familiarity with CAN, EtherCAT, DDS, SPI, UART, or real-time systems
- Embedded programming experience with STM32, ESP32, Raspberry Pi, Jetson, or similar platforms
- Experience with camera, tactile, force-torque, encoder, or IMU integration and calibration
- Familiarity with multimodal data synchronization, experiment tracking, and robotics evaluation metrics
- CAD, machining, wiring, soldering, or rapid-prototyping experience
- Located near the Bay Area with reliable transportation to San Francisco
- Available to work on-site in San Francisco five days per week, full-time, 40 hours per week
What We Do
Dream Labs is an AI company building foundation models for robots. Its flagship Dream-1 model learns from videos of everyday tasks and uses visual input plus natural-language instructions to generate actions, including for unseen robots. Through the Dream API, the company makes this capability available to developers and robot makers, helping robots perform useful work across different hardware with transferable skills.
