AI Applications Engineer
- Source: Ashby
- Standard Bots
- $120,000 to $150,000 /yr
- On-site
- New York City
- Mid level
Job Description
Who you are
- Robot programming proficiency or adjacent software experience – if you can write Python without an AI agent, you can probably program a robot having never touched one before
- Prior robotics knowledge – anything from high school robotics to professional manipulation experience; we care that you’ve actually worked with robots, not just read about them
- Surface-level fluency in ML models and techniques – you can have a real conversation about convolutional neural networks, object detection, and visual language models without Googling the definitions mid-sentence
- Technical proficiency in an engineering environment – you write documentation, manage your own projects, work well with a team, and don’t need someone watching over your shoulder
- Willingness to travel – up to 50% domestically right now; that number will come down as we grow
- Specializations (Must have at least one)
- Mechanical Design – pneumatics, camera mounts, end-of-arm tooling for manipulators; bonus points if you’ve designed a gripper
- Electrical Design – custom board fabrication, general electrical knowledge for wiring relays and solenoids in automation environments
- Machine Vision – you know which cameras and lenses to use for a given application and why; you’ve actually deployed a vision system, not just selected one on paper
- Experience with collaborative robots (UR, Fanuc, KUKA, ABB, or similar)
- Hands-on work with vision systems in a production or lab environment (Cognex, Basler, FLIR, or similar)
- Familiarity with ROS or other robotics middleware
- Background in a manufacturing or industrial automation environment
- Experience at a startup – you know what it means to build something from scratch with limited resources
- This is a builder’s role. Tinkerers and people who get bored at a desk are strongly encouraged to apply
What the job involves
- The AI Applications Engineer sits at the intersection of robotics, AI, and hands-on field work
- You’re not a pure software engineer and you’re not a pure hardware engineer – you’re the person who can look at a manufacturing challenge, figure out how computer vision or a language model makes the robot smarter, and then actually build and deploy the solution
- You’ll work closely with the sales, software and applications engineering teams to scope AI-enabled solutions, build proofs of concept in our shop, and travel to customer sites to install and commission them
- You’ll own your projects end-to-end – from initial design through field deployment and customer training
- Work with customers and the sales team to identify where AI – computer vision, object detection, visual language models – creates real leverage in their production process
- Design and build proofs of concept that validate the solution before anyone signs anything
- Develop documentation, sample code, and integration guides that help customers and internal teams replicate and scale what you’ve built
- Travel to customer sites to install, configure, and commission AI-enabled robotic cells
- Own the full integration: camera placement and calibration, model deployment, I/O configuration, testing, and sign-off
- Troubleshoot on-site when things don’t go as planned – you stay until it works
- Train customer operators and engineers on the AI capabilities of their Standard Bots deployment
- Be a trusted technical resource post-install as customers push the system into new applications
- Feed real-world deployment learnings back to our engineering and product teams
- Work with the broader applications and engineering teams on new feature testing, peripheral integrations, and platform expansion
- Help build the internal knowledge base on AI-enabled applications – what works, what doesn’t, and why
Benefits
- Employee stock options
- Paid time off
- Medical/dental/vision insurance
- Life insurance & disability insurance
- 401(k)
Skills
- Python
- ashby
