Head of Platform Mechanical & Thermal Engineering

About this role

About Etched

Etched is building hardware for frontier intelligence. We co-design chips, racks, software, and manufacturing to deliver best-in-class throughput and latency across both prefill and decode workloads. Our first products are heavily focused on inference. Backed by hundreds of millions from top-tier investors and staffed by leading engineers, Etched is redefining the infrastructure layer for the fastest growing industry in history.

Job Summary

Our Platform Team designs the servers and systems that deliver our chips’ full potential. We are seeking a Head of Platform Mechanical & Thermal Engineering to lead all aspects of mechanical architecture, advanced cooling, and CAD infrastructure for next-generation high-power density ASIC systems.

This leader will build and scale the mechanical and thermal engineering organization, with a strong focus on liquid cooling technologies and rack-level thermal management. Siemens NX is our standard 3D CAD platform, and you will also drive the deployment of industry-leading CFD and rack simulation tools to ensure performance, manufacturability, and reliability at datacenter scale.

Key Responsibilities

- Leadership & Team Growth - Build, mentor, and scale a team of mechanical and thermal engineers. - Define hiring plans and technical standards for advanced cooling and mechanical design. - Foster a culture of engineering rigor and cross-disciplinary collaboration.

- Mechanical & Thermal Architecture - Own the design of server enclosures, modules, and racks optimized for high-power ASICs. - Drive liquid cooling solutions (cold plates, manifolds, quick-disconnects, CDU integration) as well as air-assisted hybrid cooling where applicable. - Ensure mechanical designs meet standards for manufacturability, serviceability, and reliability under extreme thermal loads.

- Tools & Infrastructure - Deploy and optimize Siemens NX for CAD/PLM workflows, with integrated libraries and release processes. - Establish and scale simulation infrastructure, including: - Flowtherm and Ansys Icepak for detailed CFD of component and system thermal behavior. - MacroFlow for rack-level and datacenter fluid dynamics modeling. - Standardize validation workflows linking simulation to hardware measurements.

- Validation & Reliability - Define test plans for thermal performance, fluid integrity, and long-term reliability of liquid cooling systems. - Oversee lab infrastructure for thermal and mechanical validation at both module and rack scale. - Partner with electrical and system validation teams to ensure holistic system readiness.

- Cross-Functional & External Collaboration - Collaborate closely with silicon, electrical, and system engineers to co-optimize cooling with chip and board power delivery. - Engage with suppliers, ODMs, and datacenter partners to align design with deployment environments. - Represent mechanical and thermal engineering in executive reviews, providing visibility into risks, milestones, and resources.

You may be a good fit if you have

- 10+ years of experience in mechanical and thermal engineering for high-performance computing systems, with at least 5+ years in leadership roles.

- Proven expertise in liquid cooling architectures for high-power density ASICs or GPUs.

- Proficiency with Siemens NX for 3D CAD; experience scaling CAD/PLM environments across teams.

- Hands-on experience with Flowtherm, Ansys Icepak, and MacroFlow for CFD and rack-level thermal modeling.

- Strong record of bringing complex server or datacenter platforms from concept through production.

- Deep understanding of thermal validation, fluid integrity testing, and mechanical reliability for liquid-cooled systems.

- Bachelor’s or Master’s in Mechanical Engineering, Thermal Engineering, or related field .

Benefits

- Medical, dental, and vision packages with generous premium coverage - $500 per month credit for waiving medical benefits

- Housing subsidy of $2k per month for those living within walking distance of the office

- Relocation support for those moving to San Jose (Santana Row)

- Various wellness benefits covering fitness, mental health, and more

- Daily lunch and dinner in our office

- Unlimited compute budget subject to ROI justification

Base Salary Compensation

- $225,000 - $275,000

How We're Different

Etched believes in the Bitter Lesson http://www.incompleteideas.net/IncIdeas/BitterLesson.html. We are the first inference-focused frontier AI system, betting early on transformer and transformer-like architectures and on increasing model sizes. Our addressable market is the entirety of inference, unlike many of our competitors.

We are a fully in-person team in San Jose (Santana Row), and greatly value engineering skills. We do not have boundaries between engineering and research, and we expect all of our technical staff to contribute to both and work across disciplines as needed.

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