Principal Mechanical Engineer

Robotics startup (YC S26)·Hacker News
SF Bay AreaPosted Jul 1, 2026
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Robotics startup (STEALTH + YC S26) | Principal Mechanical + Firmware + SWE | SF Bay Area | ONSITE | $200–250k + 1–2% equity + benefits

We are a new robotics company based in Palo Alto, California, building wearable robotic devices that improve the endurance of humans on foot.

Our first product is a lightweight, bilateral hip product that reduces the physical cost of carrying heavy loads over distance, allowing personnel to move farther, carry more, and arrive at the objective less fatigued and more effective. The company is early but already operating in the field, with a direct feedback loop in the most demanding conditions imaginable.

We are backed by Y Combinator and a group of leading deep-technology investors.

We've recently moved to the Bay area to grow the team, and are hiring three lead engineers who will own product/ their domains, and have full authority with no inherited design decisions and no one between them and the problem. What you build will be worn in weeks by real users:

- Mechanical: structures, joints, actuator integration, ruggedness

- Firmware: real-time motor control, sensor fusion, embedded systems

- Software: device-to-cloud telemetry, test infrastructure, user apps

Shoot me (founder) a text (+1 857-327-3414) and I'll tell you exactly what we're building :)

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