Corvus RoboticsOperations/Manufacturing Leader
About Corvus
Every physical good spends time in a warehouse, and every warehouse tracks their inventory. Today, nearly 100% of warehouses track their inventory manually using barcode scanners and climbing forklifts.
We're Corvus Robotics. Our fully autonomous Corvus One™ drones use computer vision & robotics to automatically track inventory, improving worker safety and increasing labor efficiency. We believe that data-driven, safe inventory management will optimize the global physical economy and improve economic prosperity for humanity.
What we're seeking
We're looking for a hands-on operations leader to own our entire hardware lifecycle -- from the first supplier conversation to the moment a robot is running at a customer deployment site. This role is foundational to how Corvus scales: every unit that ships, every production run that hits yield, every customer site that comes online on time runs through you.
The ideal candidate has been in the manufacturing trenches before. They've stood up a manufacturing line -- in the US or Asia -- chased down a supplier defect across time zones, and built QA documentation that a factory team can actually follow without hand-holding. They're equally comfortable scripting a hardware test (AI-assisted is fine) and negotiating blanket purchase terms, and they understand that a defective unit at a customer site is a relationship-ending event.
Specifically, in this role you will:
Manage our vendor relationships and production runs hands-on -- both at our Mountain View facility and with contract manufacturers in Asia. When we spin up a new hardware build or need to fix a yield problem, you go there alongside teammates to fix issues -- weeks to months at a time, on the floor -- until it's right.
Own QA and bringup end-to-end: work with our robotics QA team to write the test scripts (AI-assisted scripting is fine), define pass/fail criteria, design the process, and leave documentation thorough enough that a factory team can run it without you present.
Be responsible for tracking every serialized unit from factory to deployment. You know where each robot is at all times and do your best to ensure nothing gets lost, delayed, or damaged in the logistics handoff -- including the stretch between DHL pickup and an implementation engineer receiving it at a customer site.
Run procurement and supplier coordination: purchase orders, lead times, component sourcing, blanket purchases for high-volume parts, and the proactive communication in US and Asia time (including Wechat) that keeps supply chain surprises from becoming production shutdowns.
Build and improve the ops infrastructure and software that scales with us -- processes, tooling, scripts, and eventually a small team -- as we grow from current production volumes to 10x and beyond.
This role is in-person / hybrid in Mountain View, CA, with expected multi-week travel to Asia. We encourage applicants from all backgrounds, including recent grads and international students.
What makes this role hard
You'll be the single point of accountability for everything that happens to our hardware between customer PO and deployment. There is a minimal ops team behind you and only "startup" processes -- you are building it out. Problems are time-zone-spanning and often urgent. Travel to Asia is significant and likely for weeks at a time. The right person finds this genuinely energizing, not exhausting.
Must have
3+ years in hardware manufacturing, supply chain, or physical ops at a robotics, EV, consumer electronics, aerospace, or comparable advanced hardware company
Has personally stood up or significantly improved a manufacturing line -- in the US or Asia
Comfortable writing test scripts for hardware QA (AI-assisted scripting is fine) and building process documentation from scratch
Ready and able to travel to Asia for extended periods -- weeks to months, alongside teammates -- as the role demands, especially around new production runs
Experience managing international logistics for serialized hardware, including import/export, freight forwarding, and customs, or able to find and work with credible partners / contractors for this
Nice to have
Engineering background (mechanical, electrical, or industrial engineering)
Experience with hardware BOM management, NPI, and revision control in an ERP system
Experience living and conducting operations in other geographies
Familiarity with WeChat for supplier communication (Chinese / Mandarin language skills are not required; comfort navigating the app with its built-in auto-translation feature is sufficient)
Startup background -- comfortable operating where the process doesn't exist yet