PERL COE Engineer

COE Engineer, Manufacturing Cost, Design-to-Value, and Producibility

As a COE Engineer, you will help build and deliver a new technical Center of Excellence focused on cost transparency, manufacturability, producibility, and design-to-value for complex Aerospace & Defense and advanced industrial products.

You will analyze how components, assemblies, and systems are designed, manufactured, sourced, qualified, and costed, then translate technical findings into practical recommendations for supplier negotiations, design optimization, sourcing strategy, production readiness, and cost reduction.

The role sits at the intersection of engineering, manufacturing, supply chain, and commercial strategy. It is intended for a hands‑on technical problem solver who can evaluate drawings, specifications, bills of material, manufacturing routings, supplier inputs, process assumptions, labor content, material yield, tooling, quality, overhead, and supplier economics to develop credible cost and producibility insights.

Are you ready to:

• Work on nationally important Aerospace & Defense, space, naval, propulsion, electronics, nuclear, and advanced industrial programs?
• Apply deep manufacturing and engineering expertise to real commercial, sourcing, design, and operational decisions?
• Help clients improve cost transparency, challenge supplier economics, and identify practical cost reduction opportunities?
• Evaluate product architectures, manufacturing approaches, supplier feasibility, and producibility tradeoffs across complex engineered systems?
• Work alongside experienced consultants, cost engineers, supplier experts, technical specialists, and client engineering teams?
• Help build reusable should‑cost, DFM, DTV, and producibility methods and tools for a new U.S. Center of Excellence?
• Develop a broader perspective on how products are designed, sourced, manufactured, qualified, scaled, and costed?
• Join a capability early, with meaningful opportunity to shape how the team grows?

You will:

• Develop should‑cost models for complex components, assemblies, systems, and supplier quotes.
• Assess manufacturing cost using drawings, specifications, bills of material, routing assumptions, labor content, cycle time, material usage, yield, tooling, quality requirements, overhead, and supplier economics.
• Identify supplier cost drivers, manufacturing complexity, cost outliers, margin opportunities, and commercial negotiation levers.
• Evaluate design choices for cost, manufacturability, producibility, scalability, qualification risk, and supplier feasibility.
• Identify over‑specification, avoidable complexity, tolerance‑driven cost, material or process inefficiencies, assembly challenges, and production ramp risks.
• Compare alternate manufacturing processes, product architectures, sourcing approaches, and make‑versus‑buy options.
• Translate technical analysis into actionable recommendations for engineering, sourcing, supplier management, operations, and executive stakeholders.
• Support client‑facing problem solving in ambiguous environments through rapid hypothesis development, technical validation, and structured communication of findings.
• Help codify reusable COE tools, benchmarks, cost models, playbooks, and analytical methods.

• U.S. citizen with the ability to support ITAR or restricted Aerospace & Defense work.
• Have 5+ years of experience in engineering, manufacturing engineering, cost engineering, supplier engineering, operations, product engineering, design engineering, systems engineering, producibility, DFM, DTV, or value engineering.
• Bring experience from aerospace, defense, space, propulsion, naval, electronics, nuclear, automotive, industrial equipment, complex mechanical systems, advanced manufacturing, or similar sectors.
• Possess a strong understanding of manufacturing processes including machining, casting, forging, welding, fabrication, composites, additive manufacturing, electronics assembly, final assembly, testing, tooling, inspection, and quality.
• Able to read and interpret engineering drawings, GD&T, tolerance requirements, specifications, CAD outputs, bills of material,…