Mechatronics Engineer (Onsite​/Hybrid

About the Company

The mining industry has steadily become worse at finding new ore deposits, requiring >10X more capital to make discoveries compared to 30 years ago. The easy-to-find, near-surface deposits have largely been found, and the industry has chronically under-invested in new exploration technology, relying on the manual techniques of yesteryear – even as demand accelerates for copper, lithium, and other metals to build electric vehicles, renewable energy, and data centers.

KoBold builds AI models for mineral exploration and deploys those models—alongside our novel sensors—to guide decisions on KoBold-owned-and-operated exploration programs. In the six years since founding, KoBold has become by far both the largest independent mineral exploration company and the largest exploration technology developer. Our data scientists and software engineers, who come from leading technology companies, jointly lead exploration programs with our renowned exploration geologists.

KoBold has proven its first discovery with materially less capital than the industry average and found one of the best copper deposits ever discovered: the copper is far more concentrated than the global average of copper mines, and this asset alone is expected to generate meaningful revenue for decades. KoBold has a portfolio of more than 60 other projects, each of which has the potential for another high-quality discovery.

KoBold is privately held; investors include institutional asset managers T. Rowe Price and Canada Pension Plan Investments; technology venture capitalists Andreessen Horowitz, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, BOND Capital, Durable Capital, Step Stone, and Standard Investments; and natural resources companies Equinor, BHP, and Mitsubishi.

This role will drive the design, development, and deployment of a next-generation hardware technology that will transform how KoBold collects and interprets exploration data. This role is ideal for a mechanical engineer who thrives at the intersection of science, engineering, and data and is excited about bringing new technology to life.

In this role, you will lead the full technical lifecycle of a critical new hardware system: from concept and prototyping through validation, automation, manufacturing, and deployment in the field. You will work closely with our data scientists, engineers, and geoscientists to design instrumentation that produces rich, high-quality datasets, feeding the machine learning models that drive KoBold’s mineral exploration around the world.

You will be a key member of a hardware development team and contributor to various novel hardware projects.

You will also help to build the hardware development discipline and organization at Kobold, contributing to a culture and process that will make our engineering efforts innovative, scalable and repeatable. You will report to the Head of Hardware and join a world-class team of data scientists, engineers and geoscientists developing novel technologies to accelerate the discovery of critical minerals for batteries and electrification.

• Lead the technical development of a novel, automated sensing and imaging system from concept and prototype to deployment of multiple systems in remote field sites. Coordinate with and orchestrate internal and external resources across hardware and software engineering to deliver.
• Lead system architecture definition, navigating technical tradeoffs through rigorous research and analysis and balancing cost, complexity, and timeline.
• Collaborate with KoBold's data systems and exploration teams to integrate the new data stream into KoBold's proprietary data system and ensure usability for exploration projects.
• Build a deep understanding of mineral exploration science and operations to ensure the system and data generated meet user needs and field requirements.
• Build partnerships, source, and contract with service providers and vendors to develop hardware solutions that solve KoBold exploration needs.
• Create effective product plans and mechanical, mechatronic and automation designs - from concept through prototyping and production.
• Contribute engineering…