Applications Engineer - Magnetics

Responsibilities

• Work directly with customers to understand application requirements and identify appropriate permanent magnet solutions.
• Provide guidance on magnet materials, grades, coatings, and performance characteristics.
• Serve as a primary technical point of contact for customer questions, clarifications, and issue resolution.
• Communicate technical requirements clearly between customers and internal teams.
• Drive customer programs through key milestones including sample delivery, testing, validation, and production readiness.
• Track and manage technical progress of customer engagements in coordination with the commercial team.
• Act as the voice of the customer internally, ensuring requirements, constraints, and performance expectations are clearly understood and executed.

Application Engineering & Magnet Guidance

• Guide customers in selecting appropriate magnet materials, grades, and configurations for new and existing applications.
• Evaluate customer requirements against internal manufacturing capabilities and provide DFM recommendations balancing performance, cost, manufacturability, and heavy rare earth (HRE) usage.
• Translate application needs into clear technical requirements for production and materials teams.

Execution, Quality & Problem Solving

• Coordinate with R&D, manufacturing, and quality teams to ensure alignment with customer requirements.
• Support prototyping, testing, and validation of magnet products in customer applications.
• Support root cause investigations for customer issues and non-conforming product, including corrective actions (e.g., 8D).
• Partner with internal quality teams and customers on qualification activities (e.g., PPAP, where applicable).
• Drive timely resolution of application, performance, and quality issues across internal teams.
• Operate with urgency to support fast-moving customer timelines and internal production ramp.

Customer Qualification & Program Execution

• Own technical execution of customer programs from initial engagement through qualification and production release.
• Support customer qualification processes, including PPAP, first article inspection, and validation testing where applicable.
• Ensure alignment between customer expectations and internal execution timelines.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Materials Science, Physics, or related technical field.
• 5+ years of experience in a customer-facing engineering, applications engineering, or product engineering role.
• Experience working with manufactured components in a production environment (e.g., metals, ceramics, magnets, or similar).
• Ability to interpret technical drawings, specifications, and customer requirements.
• Experience collaborating cross-functionally with manufacturing and quality teams.
• Strong problem-solving skills with experience supporting root cause investigations.
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to interface directly with customers.

Desired Skills

• Experience in automotive, aerospace, defense, or other high-reliability industries.
• Experience working with permanent magnets, particularly NdFeB materials.
• Familiarity with magnetic systems or applications (e.g., motors, sensors, actuators).
• Familiarity with quality and qualification processes (e.g., PPAP, first article inspection).
• Exposure to design-for-manufacturability (DFM) concepts in a production environment.
• Experience supporting root cause investigations and corrective actions (e.g., 8D, CAPA).
• Experience working directly with customers in a technical or applications-focused role.
• Exposure to basic electromagnetic or magnetic analysis tools (FEA or similar).