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Senior/Staff Closures Engineer

Zoox· Vehicle Development – Body, Closures and Chassis
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Foster City, CA$195k - $256kFull-timePosted 4w ago

About the role

Senior/Staff Closures Engineer responsible for owning the closures architecture for Zoox’s autonomous vehicle, including doors, latches, hinges, actuators, seals, and glazing, and driving them from concept through sourcing, validation, and launch in a fully automated, high-cycle vehicle system.

Responsibilities

  • Serve as the technical owner and subject matter expert for the complete closures system. Understand how every component interfaces within the system and with the rest of the vehicle, and anticipate interdependencies between closures and adjacent complex systems before they become integration failures.
  • Set and defend the closures architecture across current and future vehicle programs - mechanism topology, load paths, sealing and water-management strategy, actuation and state-detection strategy, tolerance and dimensional strategy, and the hardware/firmware boundary - making the trade-offs explicit in cost, mass, timing, reliability, serviceability, and manufacturability.
  • Own the closures requirements set and its rationale, and improve the flow of testing from component through subsystem to full-vehicle level so the DV plan retires the risks the architecture creates. Create the design processes and standards that outlive any single program - kinematic synthesis, system dynamic modeling, DFM, and mechanism design.
  • Personally own the design of critical closures components and mechanisms - latches, hinges, actuators, seals, glazing interfaces, or equivalent - through concept, DFMEA, sourcing, tooling, PPAP, validation, and launch, including releasing and maintaining your own production-quality CAD and drawings with GD&T.
  • Size and check your own designs using section-capacity and inertia calculations, SimSolid (or equivalent) FEA pre-processing, and Python/MATLAB mechanism and mechatronic modeling. Independently lead root cause analysis on substantial, ambiguous hardware problems and drive the fix to closure through design, process, or firmware.
  • Influence decisions at executive leadership levels, mentor engineers new to closures and to Zoox, initiate and lead projects across functions, and act as the technical point of contact for current and prospective closures suppliers across multiple commodity domains.

Qualifications

  • BS in Mechanical Engineering, Robotics, Mechatronics, or a related field.
  • 10+ years of professional experience in mechanical engineering (or 8+ years with an advanced degree), with a focus on automotive closures, complex mechanisms, or robotics.
  • Demonstrated ownership of a closures system — or an equivalently complex, integrated vehicle system — at the architecture level, including the requirements set, the integration strategy, and the trade-off decisions.
  • Proven record of taking closure systems or complex mechanisms through the full vehicle development cycle (design → sourcing → validation → launch), with mass-production experience.
  • Expert-level fluency in 3D CAD, preferably CATIA 3D experience, with the ability to personally release production-quality parts.
  • Deep experience designing automated sliding or hinged doors, liftgates, trunks, decklids, or charge-port mechanisms. Demonstrated expertise in kinematic synthesis and mechanism load-path design.
  • Strong knowledge of Design for Manufacturability, GD&T, dimensional engineering, and manufacturing processes (casting, stamping, injection molding, extrusion).
  • Able to hold a credible technical conversation with EE, firmware, CAE, manufacturing, quality, and service, and to arbitrate between them.

Skills

Required:closures architecture3D CADDFMEA / DFMmechanism design / kinematic synthesis

Benefits

  • Zoox offers a comprehensive package of benefits, including paid time off (e.g. sick leave, vacation, bereavement), unpaid time off, Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights, Amazon RSUs, health insurance, long-term care insurance, long-term and short-term disability insurance, and life insurance.
Last updated Oct 21, 2026. Interested? Apply on the company site.
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About Zoox

It's Not a Car | Zoox

Zoox is a purpose-built autonomous vehicle designed for riders, not drivers. Learn more about the Zoox robotaxi and the future of ride-hailing.

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