Lead Thermal Simulation Engineer

About the Team

Our Robotics team is focused on unlocking general-purpose robotics and pushing towards AGI-level intelligence in dynamic, real-world settings. Working across the entire model stack, we integrate cutting-edge hardware and software to explore a broad range of robotic form factors. We strive to seamlessly blend high-level AI capabilities with the constraints of physical systems to improve people's lives.

About the Role

We are seeking a lead thermal simulation engineer to help accelerate the design and development of next-generation robotic systems through modeling, simulation, and analysis. You will work closely with mechanical, electrical, controls, and robotics engineers to evaluate designs before hardware is built, identify risks early, and guide critical architecture decisions.

This role spans structural and thermal analysis and design across robotic subsystems including actuators, mechanisms, structures, electronics, and integrated systems. You will develop simulation workflows that improve engineering velocity, increase confidence in design decisions, and help us build more capable, reliable, and manufacturable robotic platforms.

This role is based in San Francisco, CA. This role will be expected to be in office 4 days per week and offer relocation assistance to new employees.

In this role, you will:

• Perform thermal simulations to assess heat generation, cooling strategies, thermal interfaces, and system-level thermal performance

• Partner with mechanical, electrical, and controls engineers to influence design decisions early in development

• Build simulation models to evaluate robotic actuators, transmissions, mechanisms, structures, soft goods, and integrated assemblies

• Correlate simulation results with physical testing and develop methodologies to improve model accuracy

• Support architecture trade studies by evaluating design concepts before hardware is built

• Develop simulation workflows, standards, and best practices that scale across the robotics organization

• Identify technical risks and recommend design changes to improve performance, reliability, and manufacturability

• Support root cause investigations by combining test data, failure analysis, and simulation results

• Contribute to long-term simulation capabilities including multiphysics modeling, digital twins, and system-level analysis

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Enjoy using first-principles engineering and simulation to solve complex multidisciplinary problems

• Are comfortable operating in ambiguous environments where simulation and design helps guide architecture decisions rather than simply validate finished designs

• Have strong intuition for mechanical systems and can connect simulation results to real-world hardware behavior

• Balance modeling rigor with practical engineering judgment and development speed

• Enjoy collaborating closely with hardware teams and influencing products from concept through deployment

Preferred qualifications:

• Experience performing thermal simulation and design of complex electromechanical systems

• Proficiency with commercial CAE tools such as Simcenter 3D, Abaqus, Ansys, Nastran, LS-DYNA, COMSOL, or equivalent platforms

• Experience correlating simulation models with physical test data and validation campaigns for high volume products

• Familiarity with robotic systems, actuators, mechanisms, power electronics, batteries, or other highly integrated hardware systems

• Experience developing simulation methodologies, automation tools, or organization-wide thermal workflows

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity. 

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

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Background checks for applicants will be administered in accordance with applicable law, and qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment consistent with those laws, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act, for US-based candidates. For unincorporated Los Angeles County workers: we reasonably believe that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship with the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of a conditional offer of employment: protect computer hardware entrusted to you from theft, loss or damage; return all computer hardware in your possession (including the data contained therein) upon termination of employment or end of assignment; and maintain the confidentiality of proprietary, confidential, and non-public information. In addition, job duties require access to secure and protected information technology systems and related data security obligations.

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