Industrial Designer

About Build AI

Build AI is the data hyperscaler for Physical AI. We're vertically integrated across hardware, manufacturing, logistics, collection, and model training to scale the physical labor dataset orders of magnitude faster than anyone in the world.

Job Summary

We're hiring industrial design in Shenzhen for the objects people actually wear and use while they work. A camera hat, a mount, a device that has to look like it belongs on a job site, not a prototype taped to a hard hat. A generalist who can also do mechanical design is strongly preferred.

Key Responsibilities

• Own industrial design from early concept through production: form, wearability, how it sits on a worker, how it comes apart for service
• Explore and communicate through sketching, CAD, rendering, and physical prototypes (3D print and factory samples)
• Develop CMF and take designs through vendors: DFM, samples, and the version that actually ships
• Work with mechanical and PCB so the board, battery, camera, and enclosure are one object
• Keep it simple enough to manufacture at the volume we need, and good enough that people will actually wear it all day
• Collaborate with Head of Design & Taste in SF on the bar; you make the thing in Shenzhen

You may be a good fit if you have (Must-have qualifications)

• Portfolio of shipped physical products, not only renders. Wearables, tools, or devices used in the real world are a plus
• Strong ID fundamentals: sketching, form, proportion, detailing, and 3D modeling (SolidWorks, Onshape, Rhino, or similar)
• You can go from sketch to factory sample, and you know when a curve is going to break tooling
• Understanding of materials, manufacturing processes, and designing for production
• Fine in Shenzhen, with vendors, and iterating in a factory instead of only in Keyshot
• Taste is obvious. You will not ship something that looks like a science fair

Strong candidates may also have experience with (Nice-to-have qualifications)

• Mechanical design (CAD, enclosures, mounts, stackups). We would rather hire a generalist than ID-only
• KeyShot or equivalent visualization
• Experience with wearables or products worn for a full shift

Benefits

• Competitive pay
• Medical, dental, and vision packages with generous premium coverage
• $500 per month credit for waiving medical benefits
• Housing subsidy of $2k per month for those living within walking distance of the office
• Relocation support for those moving to San Francisco (Financial District) or Shenzhen (Nanshan)
• Various wellness benefits covering fitness, mental health, and more
• Daily lunch and dinner in our office
• Unlimited compute budget subject to ROI justification
• Unlimited Codex and Claude credits
• Travel

How we're different

Build believes in the Bitter Lesson. By taking a general approach of learning from humans, our addressable market is all physical labor.

We are a fully in-person team in San Francisco (Financial District) and Shenzhen (Nanshan), and greatly value engineering skills. We do not have boundaries between engineering and research, and we expect all of our technical staff to contribute to both and work across disciplines as needed.

Build AI is an equal opportunity employer. We review every application. If you do not meet every bullet, still apply. Questions: research@build.ai