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Clera

Principal Mechanical Engineer

San Francisco
Salary
$235,000 - $305,000 annually
Level
Principal
Work type
On-site · San Francisco
Visa
Not offered

Open. First seen 21 October 2026.

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About the role

About the Role

Join a small defense technology engineering team developing autonomous, field-deployed directed energy systems. As Principal Mechanical Engineer, you will own system-level mechanical architecture and help take complex hardware from prototype through production and deployment.

What You'll Do

  • Lead mechanical architecture across the system and integrate it with electrical, power, embedded, and optics disciplines.
  • Make technical decisions on challenging engineering problems from concept through production readiness.
  • Guide hardware release and production processes in close collaboration with the manufacturing team.
  • Identify technical risks early and review designs, analyses, documentation, and release standards.
  • Perform hands-on design and analysis when your experience can resolve difficult problems quickly.
  • Balance cost, mass, reliability, schedule, and field performance in design and manufacturing decisions.
  • Share technical judgment and mentor engineers through direct collaboration and example.

What We're Looking For

  • At least 10 years of experience designing and shipping complex hardware systems.
  • Mechanical design as your primary discipline, including recent personal CAD and engineering analysis work.
  • Repeated experience taking hardware from prototype through manufacturing and field deployment.
  • Experience designing ruggedized systems for real-world conditions and correlating FEA or hand calculations with test data.
  • Strong mechanical expertise, with sound technical judgment in electrical engineering, power electronics, or embedded systems.
  • Experience owning mechanical architecture and integrating multiple engineering disciplines.
  • A senior individual contributor or technical lead background at a hardware company that has shipped products.
  • Relevant backgrounds may include defense, aerospace, high-performance automotive, maritime, robotics, or directed energy.
  • Experience with lasers or high-power systems, thermal management, gimbals or beam directors, military qualification standards, or production line development is useful.

Compensation & Benefits

Base salary is $235,000 to $305,000 USD annually. Visa sponsorship is not available. Equity and benefits details were not provided.

Location

This is an on-site role in San Francisco, California, United States.

What this role asks for

Particular to this role

Embedded Systems · FEA

Rare in Clera's other 299 open postings.

Compared with Clera's other open jobs.

The team: Engineering HIRES STEADILY

This role is one of 385 open in Engineering. 319 were posted in the last 30 days and the oldest in March: a team that hires all year rather than one being built.

WHAT THE TEAM WORKS WITH, ACROSS ITS POSTINGS

LLM (162 of 385), Python (160 of 385), TypeScript (151 of 385), React (122 of 385), Machine Learning (92 of 385), PostgreSQL (70 of 385), JavaScript (66 of 385)

OTHER ROLES ON THIS TEAM

From the team and dates on Clera's own job board.

Salary context

10 other open postings titled Principal Mechanical Engineer state a salary: median USD 162,860 to USD 225,275 a year.

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