• DFM review of PCB designs. Review PCBA layouts, footprints, stack-ups, and fabrication/assembly packages before release — including stack-up and controlled-impedance manufacturability. Give clear, specific DFM/DFA and design-for-test (DFT) feedback to electrical engineers; call out issues, errors, and rule violations, and drive them to resolution before the design goes to build.
• DFM automation and checking. Run systematic, rule-based DFM/DFA checks with automated tooling (Valor, CAM350, Allegro DFM, or equivalent) so reviews are consistent and repeatable rather than eyeballed and keep the rule decks current as parts, processes, and vendors change.
• Design for test (DFT). Partner with electrical engineering to build test coverage and access into designs from the start; test points, probe access, and ICT/flying-probe/boundary-scan considerations so boards are testable, not just able to be assembled.
• Manufacturing best practices. Own and uphold the DFM rule set; component spacing, courtyards and keep-outs, panelization, fiducials, thermal relief, testability, and land-pattern standards (IPC-7351 / IPC-2221 / IPC-A-610 class). Keep the standards documented and current, and make sure designs actually conform.
• Package quality and CM readiness. Ensure every output package; Gerbers, fab and assembly drawings, BOM, pick-and-place, and stack-up is complete, unambiguous, and manufacturable by whoever builds it, internal line or external CM. You are the gate a package clears before it’s released.
• SMT line and process. Own SMT/PCBA process engineering for the in-house line; stencil and paste, placement, reflow profiling, SPI and AOI, and rework. Drive process control, first-pass yield, and defect reduction; own changeovers and new-board bring-up.
• Board bring-up and test. Bring up, verify, and debug boards on the bench; fluent with oscilloscopes, multimeters, and lab instruments. Run the tests the hardware team specifies, and define test procedures on your own; help stand up automated/functional test (ATE) as we scale production.
• NPI and design-to-production handoff. Partner with electrical engineering through NPI; from first prototype builds to repeatable volume, closing the loop fast between design intent and what’s actually buildable on the floor.
• Engineering–production liaison. Be the connective tissue between electrical engineering and the production floor, translating design intent into build- and test-ready instructions and feeding real yield, defect, and test data back to design, keeping the loop between design and the floor tight and open.
• CM partnership. Serve as the manufacturing-engineering interface to external contract manufacturers: qualify processes, resolve DFM findings, review first articles, and hold CMs to our quality bar.
• Continuous improvement. Root-cause solder and assembly defects (8D/5-Whys), cut scrap and rework, and feed lessons learned back into the DFM standards so the next design starts in a better place.