Industrial Designer

About Menlo

Menlo Research is an Applied R&D lab building Asimov, an open-source humanoid robot platform, and the full software stack that powers it. Our mission is to make humanoid labor economically viable, turning software into physical labor at scale. We build across the full stack: hardware architecture, locomotion, autonomy, simulation, and infrastructure. We move fast, ship to real robots, and open-source everything we can. If you want your work to matter beyond a paper or a demo, this is the place.

The Role

Industrial design at Menlo is not cosmetic. Asimov is a physical product that will be assembled, operated, serviced, and iterated on, and how it looks, feels, and reads to the people around it is as consequential as how it performs. As our Industrial Designer, you will own the form language and physical identity of Asimov, from enclosures and surface treatments to ergonomics, CMF (color, material, finish), and packaging. You will translate that vision into parts that manufacture, assemble, and survive the real world, working shoulder to shoulder with mechanical and electrical engineers so every design decision holds up in production. This is design that ships to real hardware, not renders.

What You'll Do

• Own industrial design for Asimov and the Menlo hardware family: form, proportion, ergonomics, and CMF, from concept and form language to production-ready enclosures, covers, and structural aesthetics

• Turn mechanical and electrical constraints into clean, intentional design that does not hide the engineering

• Prototype fast in foam, print, and machined parts, then iterate on real robots to test design intent

• Own the CMF specification process: material selection, surface finish standards, color systems, and supplier engagement, and make sure those choices hold up in the field

• Own design for manufacturing and assembly alongside mechanical engineering: DFM reviews, tolerance stack-ups, fastening, serviceability, part count, and assembly sequencing, catching issues before tooling

• Design the human-facing details: grips, handles, access panels, indicators, and anything a person touches or reads

• Shape the packaging and unboxing experience and user-facing documentation for Asimov kits and development hardware

• Maintain design consistency across the Menlo hardware product family as the portfolio expands

What We Look For

• A strong portfolio of shipped physical products, ideally complex electromechanical hardware, showing a consistent design sensibility under real technical constraints

• 4 or more years shipping physical products: consumer electronics, robotics, medical devices, or similarly complex hardware

• Deep industrial design fundamentals: form, proportion, ergonomics, and CMF

• Strong proficiency in 3D modeling and surfacing (Alias, Rhino, SolidWorks, or equivalent) and rendering (KeyShot or similar), plus real DFM and DFA experience

• Working knowledge of manufacturing processes: injection molding, sheet metal, die casting, and surface finishing

• Experience working directly with mechanical engineers and contract manufacturers in a fast, iterative environment

• Comfort moving from sketch to prototype to production without needing a large team around you

• Experience designing for humanoid or legged robots, cobots, or other electromechanical systems

• A bias for building, testing on hardware, and iterating quickly, with the judgment to know when to obsess over a detail and when to ship

Nice to Have

• Experience taking a product from zero to first production run

• Hands-on shop skills: 3D printing, machining, moldmaking, and finishing

• Exposure to DFM/DFA review in a high-mix, low-volume manufacturing context

• Familiarity with simulation-driven or CAD-driven design workflows

• A feel for how design and brand reinforce each other

• Interest in open-source hardware communities

Why Join Menlo

You will define what a humanoid robot looks like at the moment the category is being written. That is a rare brief at this stage of a company, and it comes with the autonomy to match. Your work ships to real machines, in the real world, fast, alongside a small team that moves fast and takes the craft seriously. If you want your design to live in hardware people actually use rather than a slide, this is the place.

A Note on AI

You don't need deep AI expertise for every role, but we do expect everyone at Menlo to be intellectually curious, drawn to tinkering and discovery, and excited to use AI as a real collaborator in their work. For some roles, AI fluency is a core requirement. When that's the case, we'll say so explicitly in the qualifications. People who thrive here don't treat AI as a novelty. They use it to think better, and make their work easier for others to build on.

Equal Opportunity and Accommodations

We hire talented people from a wide range of backgrounds. If you're excited about a role but don't meet every bullet, we still encourage you to apply. Menlo Research is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of any legally protected characteristic. Menlo provides reasonable accommodations during the application process. If you need one, please let your recruiter know.