Materials and Process Innovation Engineer

About 1X

We’re building humanoid robots that work in home - doing the chores, handling the tasks, and giving people their time back. Simple, but it’s not.

To do this right, we have to solve robotics, AI, manufacturing - at the same time, at scale, in a form factor that has to be safe enough to live with your family. If you’re inspired by this, you’ll thrive here. We’ve been at this since 2014 and we’re at the point where the hard problems are behind us and the hard work is in front of us.

NEO is our flagship - a home robot designed to move, learn, and operate in the real world alongside real people. We’re not demoing it - we’re shipping it. We’re excited to meet you, if this excites you.

If you’ve spent your career working on problems that matter and want to see them actually reach the world - this is that moment. We’re scaling, we’re hiring with intention, and we need people who want to build something that will genuinely change how humans spend their time - safely creating abundance for all.

1X Labs exists to provide the science and technology that enables human-level, general-purpose humanoids.

Materials are a foundational technology for humanoid robotics. The performance of artificial skin, compliant structures, sensing surfaces, protective layers, and advanced mechanisms is often determined as much by material systems and manufacturing processes as by mechanical design. Our team develops the materials and fabrication technologies that enable new robotic capabilities while ensuring they can be produced reliably at scale.

Working closely with chemists, materials scientists, mechanical engineers, designers, and manufacturing teams, we transform promising material innovations into robust production-ready technologies.

Bridge the gap between material innovation and manufacturing reality.

You will develop, optimize, and scale fabrication processes for advanced soft materials, polymers, elastomers, composites, textiles, coatings, and multilayer systems that enable next-generation humanoid robots. Your work will focus on ensuring that novel material systems not only achieve exceptional performance in the lab, but can also be manufactured consistently, reliably, and economically in production environments.

As a Materials and Process Engineer, you'll play a critical role in transforming scientific breakthroughs into scalable technologies that directly impact the capabilities, durability, and safety of our robots.

• Develop robust, scalable manufacturing processes for advanced material systems used throughout humanoid robotic platforms
• Successfully transition material technologies from laboratory concepts to production-ready manufacturing workflows
• Improve process consistency, yield, throughput, and product quality through data-driven optimization and validation
• Establish clear relationships between material composition, processing conditions, microstructure, and functional performance
• Identify and implement manufacturing technologies that enable scalable production of next-generation soft and functional materials

• Deep understanding of materials processing and manufacturing science
• Strong experimental mindset with the ability to identify process sensitivities and optimize complex systems
• Ability to connect material behavior, fabrication methods, and product performance
• Strong cross‑functional collaboration skills across research, engineering, design, and manufacturing teams
• First‑principles problem solving combined with a bias toward practical execution

• MSc or PhD in Materials Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, or a related field
• 2+ years of industry or postdoctoral experience focused on materials processing, fabrication, or manufacturing technologies
• Hands‑on experience working with polymers, elastomers, composites, textiles, coatings, or multilayer material systems
• Experience with fabrication techniques such as casting, coating, lamination, calendaring, embossing, fiber processing, molding, or thermoforming
• Strong understanding of material characterization, process validation, and manufacturing scale‑up

• Exper…