Senior Mechanical Engineer, Research Hardware

About Tutor
We believe robots are the biggest lever we have to making the physical world a better, more affordable place. But robots are a rounding error in our society: nearly nine out of ten American factories and warehouses don’t even have a single robot, and robots have yet to make their way into our homes or places of business.

Tutor Intelligence is changing that.

Tutor is a robotics research and deployment company, building generally capable robot hardware and artificial intelligence to enable robots to go where no robots have gone before. Sonny is a semi-humanoid robot with frontier dexterity approaching the human form. Cassie does back-breaking work, moving boxes, pallets, and bulk goods for businesses from family-owned manufacturers to some of the largest brands in the world. Tutor robots are manufactured at scale and operate as a network, combining the whole fleet’s learned experience to train ever more capable robot artificial intelligence.

Founded at MIT and headquartered in Watertown, MA, our team is full stack: we design and manufacture robot hardware, train our own models, work directly with the smallest and largest end-customers, and maintain our fleet across the United States. We’re a team of researchers, engineers, technicians, operators, and sellers who love building things and solving hard problems.

Our mission is grand: robots everywhere, for the common good, raising the standard of living across North America, and then the world.

The Role
Tutor's research team pushes the frontier of robot capability across the full stack. Researchers have access to 100+ robots for data collection and evaluation, a massive network of teleoperators, scaled hardware and manufacturing infrastructure, and the ability to collect real world data at enormous scale. Our work covers the complete lifecycle of real-world data generation and model training from initial behavior cloning to post-training with supervised fine-tuning and reinforcement learning. And researchers and research engineers work closely with applied engineers to develop novel techniques into robot products that can be deployed at scale.

You'll own the mechanical subsystems that make robot manipulation and data collection work, carrying mechanisms, end effectors, fixtures, and sensor assemblies from uncertain requirements through fabrication, integration, validation, and repeatable builds.

What you'll work on

• Turn manipulation and data-collection goals into mechanical requirements, interfaces, and validation plans.
• Design parts and assemblies in CAD, including actuated mechanisms, end effectors, mounts, enclosures, and fixtures.
• Choose actuators, materials, bearings, fasteners, and processes based on load, stiffness, tolerance, wear, and packaging.
• Build and test prototypes, and use measurements and failure analysis to guide iteration.
• Work through integration with sensors, wiring, electronics, and control software.

Requirements

• You have owned complex mechanical design work through fabrication, integrated testing, and sustained use.
• Strong 3D CAD, engineering drawings, tolerance analysis, and GD&T.
• Sound mechanics, and design choices backed by calculation, analysis, and experiment.
• Hands-on prototyping and assembly, and a practical understanding of machining and manufacturing processes.

Nice to haves

• Robot end effectors, precision or compliant mechanisms, or other actuated hardware.
• Taking prototypes into repeatable production and using field feedback to improve reliability.
• Mechatronics, sensor integration, FEA, or basic controls and programming.

Why Tutor?
Whether you’re designing robots, closing deals, running deployments, or creating the processes that help us scale, your work doesn’t sit on a shelf. It shows up on real production floors, making physical work safer and more affordable.
Our team of 160+ is driven by curiosity and a genuine love of building. Everyone here takes real ownership, learns fast, and holds a high bar while having each other’s backs. If you love hard problems and creating things that didn’t exist before, you’ll fit right in.
Benefits

We take care of our team so they can do their best work. At Tutor, you’ll get:

Fully employer-covered health insurance, so you’re protected without the premium.
A managed 401(k) to help you plan for the future.
Generous time off: unlimited PTO and all federal holidays off for full-time salaried employees, and 16+ days of accrued paid time off plus 1.5x pay on federal holidays for hourly employees.
Regular in-office meals and team social events throughout the year.
As Tutor grows, so will our benefits. We’re continuing to invest in ways to support our team at work and beyond.
Tutor Intelligence is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes applicants from all backgrounds.