Principal Consultant - Mechanical Engineering

Sagentia Innovation, part of Science Group plc, works with global market leaders and disruptive start-ups across the medical, consumer, industrial, defence, food & beverage, agriculture, energy and life sciences sectors. We help clients identify opportunities for growth and transform these into commercially successful products and technologies

You will have the unique opportunity to work with clients from start-ups through to global market leaders. You will have a passion for technology and will use a combination of innovation, creativity and technical excellence to meet and exceed our customers’ expectations. You will work across the product development lifecycle, from new concept generation and technology validation, detailed engineering design, prototyping and transfer to manufacture. you will play a key role in delivering exceptional outcomes for our clients.

Our projects range in length from a few months through to a few years. ranging from technical interventions to solve specific problems to full product development.

Recent examples of our work have included:

• Development of core delivery engine technology for consumer beverage dispensing
• Development of a Laparoscopic surgical robotic system: control interfaces, robotic manipulators and surgical instruments
• Development of a topical cream dispenser in the personal care space
• Improvements in the efficiency of negative pressure wound therapy systems through design innovation

A Day in the life

Many of our projects require a multidisciplinary approach involving our electronics, software and applied science teams and of course the mechanical and product design team that you will be part of. This role has a focus on the creation and delivery of new product designs to our clients.

At your level of experience, we will expect you to be technically leading and mentoring your fellow development engineers as well as taking on a hands-on role in technical delivery. You will be interacting directly with clients through regular external project update meetings.

You will have the opportunity to demonstrate

• Your experience of managing projects or work packages to tight timescales throughout the full product development life cycle
• Team leadership skills, involving guiding and planning project team members’ activities
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills - confidence and capability in a client facing role
• Business development expertise by providing pre-sales input and assistance, interfacing directly with clients under the guidance of our business development team

Your work will predominately be based at our Sagentia innovation offices in Harston. There may also be opportunities to travel to client sites in Europe or USA. You will enjoy a fast-paced environment in which we solve a variety of problems from different industries.

We have

• A multitude of exciting projects in the medical, industrial, consumer and food & beverage sectors
• An energetic and widely experienced mechanical engineering and product design team

Skills, Knowledge and Expertise

• A Degree in a relevant engineering discipline. This could be Mechanical engineering, Product Design or a science-based degree such as Physics with demonstrable experience in product development
• Project management experience in delivering complex products
• Mechanical design experience to include the development of new products

The ability to

• Technically manage peers to deliver the full product development lifecycle
• Facilitate effective communication between technical teams, clients and stakeholders
• Build trusted relationships with clients ranging from start-ups to multinational organisations
• Present technical proposals, project updates, issue resolution, and final outcomes to clients
• Support business development activities including proposal preparation, bid support and technical consultancy.
• Enthusiasm to work within multidisciplinary teams and multi-task across projects

To effectively evidence your experience, it is anticipated that you will have at least 10 years of post-graduate experience in product development.

You might also have (but not essential):

• Experience of developing products under the regulatory constraints required for medical product development
• CAD design experience (preferably with SolidWorks and/or CREO)
• Analytical skills ranging from tolerance analysis to employing tools such as FEA and Multiphysics modelling (COMSOL), through to first principles engineering calculations, potentially using tools such as MATLAB and MATHCAD
• Mechatronic design experience for complex electromechanically products
• Experience of designing complex plastic parts for moulding
• Experience of design for manufacture and assembly