Job
In this role, you will develop control system architectures, lead the implementation of real-time solutions, and work on integrating complex systems for future energy technologies.
Job summary
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Your role in the team
- Join us as a Principal Control Systems Engineer and help deliver the clean energy of the future. In this role, you will help shape the long-term control systems architecture and technical vision, define standards, and lead the end-to-end delivery of critical control systems across our experimental and production environments in Germany and the USA, working with a passionate, cross-functional team.
- Design the system-level architecture for control systems across facilities, making strategic platform and technology choices in collaboration with program and system owners.
- Direct real-time and embedded control solution implementation, selecting and guiding the use of PLC, FPGA, and other real-time platforms while balancing performance, reliability, safety, and cost trade-offs.
- Work together with system integrators, electrical engineers, panel builders, and technicians to specify, design, review, test, install, and commission control cabinet hardware and field devices.
- Work together with the software team to architect and deliver fully integrated SCADA, HMI, and data systems for alarms, logging, historian, analytics, data reduction, dashboards, etc., ensuring scalability and high performance.
- Orchestrate system integration across multiple complex subsystems and teams; define observability, logging, and diagnostic strategies, and lead root-cause investigations and postmortem analyses of active systems to capture lessons learned and contribute to continuous availability improvements.
- Shape requirements, documentation and validation approaches at system level, including design specs, interfaces and test strategies for reliability, safety and long-term maintainability.
- Coach and mentor senior and junior engineers, identify capability gaps, develop technical skills in key areas, and champion best practices in software engineering, testing, quality, and ways of working within and beyond the controls team.
Our expectations of you
Education
- Degree in Electrical/Electronic Engineering, Control/Automation, Mechatronics/Robotics, Physics, or a related field; PhD or equivalent experience preferred, with recognition as a technical expert in control, embedded, or real-time systems.
Qualifications
- Proven track record specifying control cabinet hardware; defining house standards, ensuring compliance with regulations, liaising with system integrators, and creating test plans and quality control processes.
- Proven track record specifying control software and/or SCADA and data acquisition systems; defining interfaces, patterns and coding standards across teams, and guiding technology trade-offs.
- Excellent communicator (English), able to influence technical direction at the organizational level, handle and resolve ambiguities in requirements and processes, and build alignment across hardware, software, product, and operations teams in hybrid, cross-site environments.
- Practical, hands-on approach with a strong track record orchestrating large-scale HW/SW integration, resolving integration challenges, and leading complex debugging and fault-finding on real systems.
- Desirable skills and knowledge (please highlight any of the following in your application):
- SCADA (especially Ignition) and/or designing and deploying SCADA systems and applying cross-site HMI standards for large-scale and complex systems.
- Embedded or real-time systems (FPGAs, RTOS, microcontrollers, robotics), including platform selection and long-term maintainability strategies.
- LabVIEW architect level (CLA) with a focus on FPGA and embedded targets.
- Image processing and machine vision, motion control and robotics, high-precision stepper/piezo systems and encoders.
Experience
- Typically 10+ years in control/embedded systems, factory or plant automation, automated test systems, or complex scientific experimental work, with architectural ownership across multiple projects or products.
- Deep experience in at least one relevant domain (e.g., high-energy lasers, nuclear, robotics, power/energy, automotive, aerospace, industrial automation), with an understanding of domain-specific constraints, standards, and regulations, as well as supplier ecosystems and key players.
- Extensive experience with embedded and real-time platforms (e.g., PLCs in ST IEC 61131-3, FPGAs, RTOS-based systems, robotics), including selecting platforms and scaling architectures with clear RAM vs. cost/reliability trade-offs.
- Understanding of software/firmware engineering best practices (version control, branching, design for test, CI/CD, automated testing, defensive programming) and experience introducing or improving these practices, and organizing or conducting training programs across teams or organizations.
- Deep experience in PLC programming in ST (IEC 61131-3); Beckhoff PLCs and TwinCAT system design and architecture; distributed control across multiple PLCs.
- Experience with complex scientific equipment or large-scale facilities, including diagnostics, vacuum systems, motion platforms and safety interlocks.
What we offer
- Focused Energy is an equal opportunity employer committed to creating an inclusive environment. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender perception or identity, national origin, age, marital status, protected veteran status, or disability status.
- Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, Focused Energy will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.
- Compensation offered will be determined by factors such as location, level, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. Certain roles may be eligible for incentive compensation, equity, and benefits.
Topics you will work on
Job locations
About your employer
Focused Energy GmbH is a German-American company with offices in Darmstadt and Berlin, specializing in the development of technologies for laser-driven fusion. The company aims to make fusion energy available on an industrial scale, combining scientific and technical expertise from Germany and the USA.
- Startup
- Onsite
- Power Sector, Economy
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