{"id":3834350,"url":"https://alion.io/job/clera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3","title":"Principal Mechanical Engineer","company":{"id":2706,"name":"Clera","domain":"getclera.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/clera","size_band":"11-50","is_staffing_agency":true,"employer_type":"agency","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Ashby","truth_index":{"grade":"B","score":80,"open_postings":39,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":1,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":6,"computed_at":"2026-11-08T05:47:12Z"}},"role":"Industrial Engineering","role_family":"Industrial Engineering","seniority":"lead","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["San Francisco, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":235000,"max":305000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":305000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":10,"visa_sponsorship":true,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-11-05T17:28:01Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-11-05","last_verified_at":"2026-11-08T16:42:51Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":3,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":3},"description":"About the Role\nJoin a small defense technology team developing autonomous directed-energy systems for counter-drone applications. As Principal Mechanical Engineer, you will own system-wide mechanical architecture and help take complex hardware from prototype through production and field deployment.\nWhat You'll Do\nLead mechanical architecture and integration across electrical, power, embedded, and optics subsystems.\n\nMake technical decisions on challenging hardware problems from concept through production readiness.\n\nGuide hardware release and production processes in partnership with manufacturing teams.\n\nReview designs, calculations, and test results to identify risks early and maintain high engineering standards.\n\nPersonally execute mechanical design work when your experience can resolve a problem quickly.\n\nBalance cost, mass, reliability, schedule, and field performance in design and manufacturing decisions.\n\nMentor engineers through hands-on technical leadership and design reviews.\n\nWhat We're Looking For\n10 or more years designing and shipping complex hardware systems, including multiple transitions from prototype through manufacturing and deployment.\n\nMechanical engineering is your primary discipline, with recent hands-on experience in CAD, structures, mechanisms, and packaging.\n\nDeep mechanical expertise and sound judgment in at least one additional area, such as electrical engineering, power electronics, or embedded systems.\n\nExperience leading full-system hardware integration and designing equipment for demanding real-world environments.\n\nAbility to correlate FEA or hand calculations with bench or field test data.\n\nBackground as a senior individual contributor or technical lead at a hardware organization that shipped products.\n\nExperience in defense hardware, aerospace, robotics, high-performance automotive, maritime, or a related field is valuable. Directed energy, laser or high-power systems, thermal management, ruggedized equipment, and manufacturing scale-up experience are also relevant.\n\nCompensation & Benefits\nBase salary: $235,000 to $305,000 annually. Visa sponsorship is not available.\nLocation\nOn-site in San Francisco, California, United States.","description_format":"text","description_chars":2200,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":10,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":[],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United States","iso":"US","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":[],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-11-05T20:30:05Z"}],"visa":[{"country":"US","licensed_sponsor":false,"adverts_offering_sponsorship_24m":47,"sanctioned_now":false,"evidence":"Offered visa sponsorship in 47 of its adverts here in 24 months","filings_12m":0,"filings_prev_12m":0,"green_card_filings_12m":0,"median_offered_wage_usd":null,"route":null,"cap_exempt":false,"checked_at":"2026-11-08T10:45:15+00:00","sources":["Alion: sponsorship offered in the employer's own job adverts (24 months)"],"filings_for_role_12m":0}],"liveness":{"score":30,"band":"fade","label":"Fading","p_open":1,"p_active":0.337,"p_room":0.9,"age_days":2,"expected_fill_days":6,"reasons":["conf:1","agency","stale_co","velocity","win:mid","comp:brand"],"computed_at":"2026-11-08T05:47:12Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":305000,"is_top_pay":true},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/clera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/clera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-11-08T18:30:13Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":38785,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-09T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.1,"usd":0.01,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":2706},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=2706"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fclera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":2,"usd":0.2},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fclera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.1,"usd":0.01},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fclera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/clera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fclera-principal-mechanical-engineer-3"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":3834350}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"getclera.com","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":3834350},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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