Senior Battery Production Engineer

Senior Battery Production Engineer

Corporate Background

Gridtential Energy is a Silicon Valley energy storage startup in the process of commercializing its proprietary Silicon Joule® Technology. Silicon Joule incorporates patented silicon wafers & associated processing techniques into a novel bipolar battery architecture. This innovative approach to battery design combines the traditional benefits of lead acid batteries – low cost, recyclability, and safety – with the recharge performance and life cycle benefits usually associated with lithium-ion batteries. The result is a high-performance and low-cost energy storage platform attracting attention in major applications including the automotive, energy storage, and industrial markets. 

Gridtential’s business model is built upon a capital-light design, supply, and license approach that partners, rather than competes, with the world’s leading battery manufacturers. We start with our OEM partners to optimize our technology around their applications. Next, we leverage our expertise in silicon processing techniques through a high-volume Asian supply chain. Meanwhile, battery assembly expertise is jointly developed with our highly experienced licensed partners who handle OEM fulfillment. Commercialization efforts are currently underway worldwide with several global manufacturers and joint pilot production has already been initiated with one of Gridtential’s licensed partners. These collaborative partnerships have brought together Silicon Valley thinking and a century’s worth of manufacturing expertise.  

Gridtential is staffed with a team of serial entrepreneurs, experienced managers, creative engineers, and master technicians. We treasure an open, direct, and politic-free culture that focuses on high productivity and collaborative achievement of ambitious goals in an enjoyable working environment. Come help us change the landscape of energy storage and create a cleaner, more efficient energy future for all.

Role Background

Gridtential is growing quickly to achieve commercial release of its first battery product. In addition, the Gridtential team is always working in parallel on new platforms and new innovations to push Silicon Joule technology into ever more demanding markets. In general, Silicon Joule batteries are divided into High Power and High Energy platforms. Within those groupings, there are multiple battery voltages and sizes to address myriad market needs. The Senior Battery process engineer will join the existing Battery Engineering team at Gridtential and take ownership of development and production release of the production equipment at least one of these platforms. The role will require a deep understanding of battery design, equipment design, scaling equipment design, namely how to verify that batteries and equipment are meeting clearly defined performance requirements and how to iterate the design through multiple evolutions until success is achieved. The ideal candidate will have deep prior experience in developing equipment for industrial scale manufacture of batteries and/or cells (of any chemistry) and be comfortable operating under a structured, stage gate process. The Senior Battery Process Engineer will have exciting opportunities to specify the direction of Silicon Joule technology development and will become a key technical decision maker. This role will require excellent organizational and interpersonal skills, but also provides unique abilities to grow in many different directions.  

Responsibilities 

• Own battery cell manufacturing equipment design electrochemical performance for multiple platforms (starting with one)
• Modify and/or build out predictive performance models to predict equipment and related battery assembly 
• Collaborate with the Battery Design Team and Active Material Team to specify and validate optimal process parameters formulations and additives
• Define validation plans to verify equipment and support battery performance across a range of expected operating conditions and present results to the broader team
• Review battery production equipment performance data and related battery performance data, identify areas of weakness, and propose changes to improve performance - requires collaboration with battery design team package and silicon Material teams
• Drive DOE’s to optimize the production equipment internal cell design parameters and the related critical process parameters
• Ability to design custom equipment
• Conduct regular design reviews with the broader engineering team
• Conduct teardowns of failed cells, identify analysis of root causes of failure, and develop suggest modifications to address weaknesses
• Contribute significantly in the lab – characterize electrochemical and physical performance, improve existing characterization tools, and develop new tools as needed
• Work in close collaboration with Gridtential’s Licensed Partners to implement new battery platforms at their facilities
• Act as a technical lead for new programs - help define timelines and scopes of work work with engineering teams at other facilities to generate high performing production equipment to deliver high performing cells/batteries
• Travel to locations may be required to troubleshoot and resolve issues
• Define pass/fail criteria for equipment designs for different scales of production of in spec batteries at target economics  in-process inspection of batteries on production lines
• Collaborate with Manufacturing Process team to specify large-scale processes for manufacturing batteries
• Update and maintain data relevant data to support equipment  and process  processing code (mostly Python)  
• Manage pilot level production process
• Summarize and present technical results to the broader engineering team
• Work with external companies labs and partner facilities to conduct identify and test production equipment battery testing and analysis
• Communicate across a cross functional team, including vendors, to resolve technical issues
• Document into doc control all relevant specifications and test plans

Skills and Knowledge

• Extensive experience in design and implementation of industrial scale process equipment
• Demonstrated experience scaling process equipment for batteries
• Ability to creatively identify new equipment, partners, or approaches to develop industrial production processes
• Strong troubleshooting and failure analysis skills
• Extensive experience with battery/cell design and common failure modes (including teardown analysis)
• Familiarity with lead-acid battery development and/or testing a plus
• Strong collaboration skills with battery design team
• Experience operating and interpreting data from battery cycling equipment like Maccor, Arbin, Neware, etc
• Matlab and/or Python coding experience preferred
• Experience designing and testing fully instrumented battery cells a plus
• Exemplary verbal and written communication skills
• Demonstrated analytical and problem-solving skills
• Excellent laboratory safety practices

Qualification and Experience

• 6 years of experience in battery process development / battery equipment design  development
• B.S. in chemical engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, or similar