Senior Mechanical Engineer (m/w/d)

As a Senior Mechanical Engineer, you will own the mechanical architecture of Cerberus, our high-power laser drilling system. Your scope runs from the downhole tool and its pressure-bearing housings to the surface deployment hardware. You'll make the key design decisions, set the qualification strategy, and take hardware from concept to field deployment at multi-kilometre depths, hundreds of bar of pressure, high temperatures and in abrasive rock. This is a senior, hands-on technical leadership role. You'll work directly with the founding team and with engineers in optics, robotics, geoscience and applied physics. You'll define how mechanical engineering is done at Hades: design standards, review processes, test philosophy. As the team grows, you'll mentor and help hire the engineers who join it.

Responsibilities

• Own the mechanical architecture of the laser drilling tool and deployment system, including pressure housings, sealing systems, structural components, thermal management and deployment mechanisms. You make the key trade-offs and document them.
• Define and lead the analysis and qualification strategy. This covers structural, thermal, fatigue and fluid analysis (FEA/CFD), plus test campaigns that prove designs against extreme downhole loads, pressures and temperatures.
• Establish engineering processes, including design reviews, drawing and tolerancing standards, material and supplier qualification, and configuration management, without slowing a fast-moving startup.
• Lead design for manufacturing and assembly, and build a reliable supplier base for precision machining, special materials, seals and pressure-rated components.
• Design and run test rigs and test campaigns under representative pressure, temperature and load, and turn the results into design iterations quickly.
• Take hardware into the field. You'll lead mechanical integration, commissioning and troubleshooting on real drilling sites.
• Act as the mechanical interface to the optical, electrical and software teams, so that the whole system is robust rather than each subsystem being optimised on its own.
• Mentor engineers, raise the technical bar, and help grow the mechanical engineering team.

• BSc or MSc in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering or a related field. A PhD is a plus but not required.
• 8+ years designing high-reliability mechanical systems for harsh environments. Oil & gas downhole tools, aerospace, space, defence, fusion, subsea, or similar domains are strongly preferred.
• A track record of owning complex hardware from concept through qualification to field-proven or flight-proven deployment, as the technical lead rather than a contributor.
• Deep expertise in pressure vessel and pressure-housing design, sealing technologies, fatigue and fracture, materials selection for extreme conditions, and tolerance analysis. Familiarity with relevant standards (for example ASME, API or ECSS) is a plus.
• Hands-on fluency in CAD (Siemens NX, SolidWorks or equivalent) and FEA (Ansys, Abaqus or similar). You check analysis yourself, not just review it.
• Experience defining test and qualification programmes and building the rigs to execute them.
• Experience mentoring engineers and leading design reviews, ideally in a startup or other high-ownership environment.
• Exceptional ability, shown for example through patents, landmark programmes, top-tier academics, or having built something hard from scratch.
• Excellent written and oral communication in English. German is a plus.
• Willing to live in the greater Munich area and to travel to field sites.

We offer

• An opportunity to make a huge impact on the future of Europe by increasing resilience and providing a path to resource and energy sovereignty
• A senior role with real ownership: you will shape the mechanical engineering function of a deep-tech company from its early days
• A human-centered company culture with super nice and supportive colleagues
• A great sense of community through team events and fun in and outside the office
• Highly competitive compensation, benefits and equity package