Principal Mechanical Design Engineer - Livermore, CA, United States
$110,700 - $145,320 USD yearly
Originally posted 7 July 2026 by the employer.
About the role
The Mechanical Design Engineer is responsible for designing, developing, validating, and delivering mechanical design solutions for products and systems that support FormFactor’s semiconductor test and measurement products. The role supports probe card mechanical design and architecture development across detailed design, prototype build, validation, and production release.
What you'll do
- Create and release detailed mechanical designs for precision components, characterization fixtures, validation structures, and mechanical assemblies. - Build, inspect, assemble, and troubleshoot prototype hardware during development, validation, and product release phases. - Use 3D CAD tools to create models, layouts, detailed drawings, and bills of materials for manufacturable designs. - Perform engineering analysis, including tolerance studies, fit checks, design reviews, and basic finite element analysis when needed. - Support probe card mechanical design and architecture development through detailed design, prototype build, validation, and production release. - Collaborate with manufacturing, quality, process, and R&D teams to resolve product manufacturing issues and probe card issues in the field.
What you'll need
- Minimum of 5 years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree, or 3 years and a Master’s degree, or a PhD without experience, or equivalent work. - Proficiency in 3D CAD modeling, Autodesk AutoCAD, SolidWorks, and SolidWorks PDM. - Experience with mechanical design, tolerance analysis, and Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing (GD&T). - Experience working hands-on in a lab, prototype build, inspection, or manufacturing environment. - Knowledge of precision metrology, inspection methods, and mechanical testing.
Nice to have
- Working knowledge of GD&T, tolerance analysis, design for manufacturability, and mechanical assembly practices. - Experience supporting design reviews, engineering validation, troubleshooting, and cross-functional problem solving. - Knowledge of inspection methods, metrology, mechanical testing, and prototype validation. - Demonstrated ability to improve design processes, templates, standards, and documentation for repeatability and scalability.
This role has been open 105 days — well above the 51-day median for Hardware Systems Engineering roles.
Hardware Systems Engineering · AI ML Hardware
|
Open roles in category
992
|
Median days open
51 d
|
Median salary
$154k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, and who else is hiring
| Metric | FormFactor | All employers we track in this specialty (992 roles · 104 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 9 | 992 |
| Open roles in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family | 17 | 6296 · 145 employers |
| Median days open | 48 d | 51 d (−3 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $154k |
Who's hiring in this category
- Intel Corporation · 76 open roles · median 33 d
- KLA Corporation · 63 open roles · median 47 d
- Teradyne · 57 open roles · median 33 d
- NVIDIA · 52 open roles · median 68 d
- Applied Materials · 51 open roles · median 69 d
- AMD · 47 open roles · median 53 d
How we counted: 992 open Hardware Systems Engineering (AI ML Hardware) roles from 104 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 21 Oct 2026. Specialty figures count only roles carrying this exact specialty label, so an employer's related work in neighbouring specialties is not included there — it is counted in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family row. Figures refresh nightly.