About Job Role
We are seeking a hands-on NPD & VAVE Electrical Engineer, with 7-10 years of experience, to develop new products and implement value-engineering, redesign, and lifecycle improvements across both industrial AC power and motor-control systems and embedded controller electronics used in Potter Fire Safety & Suppression and nitrogen-generation products.
The role covers 1-phase and 3-phase compressor motors, motor starters and drives, protection devices, solenoid valves, control-panel wiring, and harnesses, as well as controller PCB architecture, power supplies, sensing, I/O, communications, and user interfaces.
The candidate must be able to translate requirements into complete electrical designs, dissect existing circuits and wiring systems, develop prototypes, perform board and system bring-up, complete verification, and support controlled production release.
Demonstrated hands-on contribution to both NPD and implemented VAVE or cost-reduction programs is required; this is not a costing-only, teardown-only, or documentation-only role.
Key Responsibilities
1. Value Engineering & Cost-Down Execution
- Perform electrical teardown, functional analysis, circuit dissection, BOM analysis, and competitive benchmarking, and translate findings into NPD requirements and redesign opportunities.
- Identify opportunities for component commonization, alternate components, circuit simplification, wiring reduction, platform reuse, regional configuration, target-cost achievement, and variant rationalization across new and existing products.
- Develop VAVE concepts into complete electrical designs, prototypes, BOM updates, and release ready engineering changes, while applying design-to-cost principles during NPD.
- Quantify target cost, performance, safety, reliability, compliance, schedule, and implementation trade-offs before recommending a new architecture or design change.
2. AC Power, Motors, Drives & Industrial Controls
- Develop and redesign 230/240 VAC 1-phase and 3-phase systems at 50Hz/60Hz; support 415/460/480 VAC systems where applicable.
- Select, size, and validate AC motors and compressor-motor packages from small fractional horse power units through approximately 7.5HP for new and modified products.
- Design and evaluate motor starters, contactors, overload relays, circuit breakers, fuse banks, phase protection, control transformers, and motor drives, soft starters, or VFDs where applicable.
- Create and troubleshoot control panels, wiring diagrams, terminal blocks, protective earth, harnesses, interlocks, pressure switches, relays, indicators, and emergency or fault circuits.
- Integrate and validate solenoid valves, compressor unloaders, electromechanical actuators, sensors, switches, and other line-voltage or low-voltage controlled devices.
- Verify motor starting and inrush, phase sequence and rotation, steady-state current, power, thermal behaviour, overload protection, fault response, functional sequence, and safe isolation.
3. Embedded Hardware Design & Redesign
- Develop and redesign microcontroller-based controller hardware, including analog, digital, and mixed-signal circuits, for both new products and existing-platform improvements.
- Design AC-DC, DC-DC, and LDO power sections; pressure, current, and temperature sensing interfaces; relay, contactor, and solenoid drivers; dry-contact outputs; and protection circuits.
- Develop or modify interfaces such as SPI, I2C, UART, RS-485, CAN, Ethernet, USB, display/keypad connections, and DIP-switch or configuration inputs as applicable.
- Own hardware requirements, schematic capture, component selection and derating, PCB layout guidance or review, board bring-up, debugging, verification, and engineering release.
- Design for EMC, ESD, surge, EFT, transients, creepage, clearance, grounding, isolation, signal integrity, electrical safety, and robust industrial operation.
- Drive reusable circuit blocks, common controller hardware, and configuration-based differentiation across models and regional variants wherever technically feasible.
4. Cross-Functional Collaboration & Implementation
- Own electrical work packages on assigned NPD, redesign, sustenance, and VAVE programs while working closely with the Senior Mechatronics Engineer, Mechanical, Firmware, Validation, and Potter US stakeholders.
- Define hardware-firmware and electrical-mechanical interfaces and coordinate changes required by new sensors, controller components, motor controls, valves, displays, or communications.
- Support prototype builds, supplier technical reviews, design transfer, qualification, production trials, and implementation for both new-product launches and VAVE changes.
5. Quantitative Analysis & Business-Case Development
- Build target-cost and fact-based electrical and electronic cost breakdowns covering motors, control components, PCBAs, wiring, harnesses, connectors, protection devices, assembly, test, tooling, and implementation effort.
- Prepare architecture and component trade-off analyses, technical feasibility, ROI, payback, and risk inputs for NPD concept selection and VAVE decisions.
- Track NPD cost against target and projected versus implemented VAVE savings, and support verification of recurring benefits with Potter US Finance and Supply Chain.
6. Compliance & Risk Management
- Perform electrical DFMEA, design reviews, component derating, fault analysis, verification planning, and change-risk assessment for new and modified designs.
- Ensure all new and changed designs maintain electrical safety, motor and panel protection, EMC performance, functional reliability, serviceability, and field performance.
- Maintain disciplined requirements traceability and configuration management across regional voltage, frequency, model, PCB, wiring, firmware, and product variants.
7. Sustenance & Lifecycle Optimization
- Resolve component obsolescence, single-source, availability, quality, and supplier-process risks through technically validated alternatives and design improvements.
- Use field-return, warranty, service, and production-test data to identify electrical and electronic reliability, cost-of-quality, and next-generation product improvements.
- Create reusable design blocks, preferred-component lists, common wiring and controller strategies, engineering standards, test methods, and lessons learned for NPD and VAVE programs.
Qualifications
- 7-10 years of relevant electrical/electronic product engineering with demonstrated end-to-end implementation responsibility on both NPD and VAVE or cost-reduction programs.
- Bachelor's or Master's degree in Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Electronics & Telecommunication, Mechatronics, or a related discipline.
- Demonstrated contribution from requirements and concept selection through detailed design, prototype, verification, engineering release, and production support; proposal-only, costing-only, or sourcing-only experience is insufficient.
- Practical experience with 230/240 VAC single-phase and three-phase systems, 50Hz/60Hz operation, AC motors, starters, contactors, overload protection, fuses, breakers, panel wiring, and solenoid-controlled equipment.
- Practical experience with microcontroller-based schematic design, analog and digital interfaces, power conversion, sensor conditioning, drivers, communications, PCB design support, board bring-up, and debugging.
- Ability to create electrical requirements, schematics, wiring diagrams, single-line diagrams, cable schedules, PCB schematics, BOMs, test specifications, and controlled release documentation.
- Strong working knowledge of the NPD lifecycle and VAVE methods, including requirements, architecture, design reviews, design-to-cost, teardown, benchmarking, BOM analysis, component standardization, alternate qualification, DFM, DFMEA, DVP&R, and cost-benefit trade-offs.
- Experience with compressors, pumps, industrial process equipment, fire and life-safety products, suppression systems, nitrogen generators, or comparable regulated electromechanical products.
- Experience with 415/460/480 VAC systems, motor drives, soft starters, VFDs, power-quality analysis, or three-phase laboratory commissioning is desirable.
- SAVE/VMA, Lean Six Sigma, or formal VAVE training is advantageous, but hands-on NPD and implemented VAVE experience is mandatory.
Core Competencies
Ownership Mindset | Product Development | Electrical Safety | Circuit & System Thinking | Design to-Cost | Hands-on Execution | Reliability | Collaboration | Continuous Improvement