--- title: 'Intern, System Integration & Test Automation (Spring 2027) at Heron Power' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/intern-system-integration-test-automation-spring-2027-heron-power-scotts-valley-zh64fz1y5hak' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-11-07' --- # Intern, System Integration & Test Automation (Spring 2027) at Heron Power - **Company:** Heron Power - **Location:** Scotts Valley, CA - **Employment:** full-time - **Work type:** onsite - **Posted:** 2026-05-11 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-11-07 - **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/heron-power/7c3f30a6-f806-4bf5-a94c-cb4dece20cb2 ## Job description What to Expect Heron Power is a startup company building cutting-edge power electronics for the 21st-century grid. We aim to de-bottleneck the growth of electricity generation and consumption with scalable, innovative, and less costly hardware solutions, accelerating the electrification of everything. Our first goal is to build better converters (inverters & rectifiers) to connect large-scale renewables, storage, and loads to the grid. Heron’s leadership team is made up of seasoned veterans who have designed and shipped gigawatts of power conversion products over the past decade. We understand that no one individual knows everything. We will all learn a lot together and from each other. We strive to build a collaborative, enriching environment conducive to personal, technical, and career growth. You can expect to work in a dynamic environment, driven by first principles engineering, solving difficult problems—with a strong bias toward hands-on execution and learning by doing. Job Overview You will build and operate the test infrastructure we use to validate grid-tied converters. This role owns a meaningful slice of the development loop: test bench design and build, test execution, data analysis, failure isolation, and verified fixes. You will uncover real design and process failures by running physical tests and building automated equipment and data workflows. We prioritize a strong foundation in first principles, practical skill, and a bias toward getting things done. We care as much about how you work as what you already know. ## How You Will Contribute Test Bench Architecture & Build - Design and build electrical reliability test benches for power electronics hardware—inverters, DC/DC converters, bi-directional power stages. - Specify, procure, and integrate lab equipment: programmable power supplies, electronic loads, DAQ systems, sensors, protection hardware, interlocks, and cabling. - Own the bench system design: grounding, measurement integrity, EMI-aware instrumentation, protection strategy, safe operating procedures, and maintainability. Software & Test Automation - Contribute to our software test infrastructure for system integration and reliability testing — test architecture, hardware abstraction layers, and result reporting pipelines. - Write software tests that interact directly with hardware and firmware over CAN, UART, Modbus, TCP/IP — debugging signal integrity, protocol failures, and firmware edge cases. - Write concurrent, fault-tolerant software for our next-generation manufacturing test platform: Firmware Flashing, FCT, EOL stations running autonomously on the factory floor. - Build AI agents that manage test execution across facilities — initiating runs, monitoring anomalies, implementing test script and firmware changes in response to failures, and routing issues to humans Test Execution & Reliability Campaigns - Translate test goals and suspected failure mechanisms into test plans, stress profiles, instrumentation plans, and pass/fail criteria. - Execute reliability campaigns—burn-in, power cycling, thermal stress, and abuse tests—and evolve them as we learn where the real failure cliffs are. - Drive fast debug loops during excursions: isolate, instrument deeper, reproduce, and verify that corrective actions eliminate the failure. ## What You Will Bring We prioritize a strong foundation in first principles, practical skill, an inquisitive mindset, and a proactive attitude. We care as much—or more—about how you work as what you already know. Must-Have Requirements - Pursuing a BS or MS in Electrical Engineering, Mechatronics, or a related field. - Hands-on experience designing, building, or operating electrical test setups for complex hardware—power electronics strongly preferred. - Comfort with bench power equipment and measurement methods: scopes, DMMs, power analyzers, electronic loads, DAQ, and sensors. - Ability to design safe test systems for high-power hardware: interlocks, protection, grounding, and safe operating procedures. - Strong debugging instincts and ability to drive root-cause closure with engineering partners. - Programming experience in Python—including instrument control or data automation. Nice-to-Haves - Experience with accelerated or environmental stress testing (HALT/HASS, thermal/humidity cycling, power cycling). - Familiarity with failure mechanisms in power electronics and structured root cause/corrective action loops. - Experience designing repeatable test cells with drawings and instructions to turn scrappy setups into production-quality ones. If you are passionate about technology and enjoy working in a fast-paced environment, we would love to hear from you. Join us in accelerating the electrification of everything at Heron Power. ## About Heron Power ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: Heron Power develops next-generation medium-voltage power electronics, including solid-state transformers, to modernize the electrical grid for AI data centers, renewable energy, and surging electricity demand. - **Entity Type**: Private (Series B) - **Headquarters**: Scotts Valley, California, United States - **Founded**: 2024 - **Founders**: Drew Baglino ## Core Business - **Primary industry/industries**: Electric Power Transmission, Control, and Distribution; Industrial Power Electronics; Energy Infrastructure - **Target customers**: B2B — hyperscale data center operators, solar and storage developers, utility-scale energy project developers, and the broader electricity sector. - **Mission or purpose statement**: To build power electronics purpose-built for the 21st-century grid, helping the electricity sector grow faster and more affordably with scalable, reliable, and software-integrated infrastructure. ## Products & Services - **Heron Link for Data Centers**: An integrated solid-state transformer + SuperBBU (battery backup unit) solution purpose-built for AI and hyperscale power needs, enabling more efficient, scalable, and reliable power delivery. - **Heron Link for Solar & Storage**: An integrated solid-state transformer and inverter in one infinitely scalable platform, designed to streamline the connection of renewable generation and battery storage to the grid. ## Market Standing - **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not publicly disclosed. - **Key Metric**: Total Funding of **$178 million** across two rounds (Series A: $38M led by Capricorn Investment Group in June 2025; Series B: $140M led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz in February 2026). - **Notable Investors/Partners**: - **Investors**: Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz (American Dynamism Fund), Capricorn Investment Group, Gigascale Capital, Valor Equity Partners, Energy Impact Partners, Powerhouse. - **Advisors**: JB Straubel (Tesla Co-Founder), Zach Kirkhorn (Former Tesla CFO). - **Strategic Partner**: LG Energy Solution Vertech (collaboration to integrate Heron Link with U.S.-manufactured battery energy storage systems). - **Growth Signals**: - Headcount has grown **975% year-over-year** to 72 employees, with 58 active job postings. - Awarded **$26.375 million** in tax credit incentives from the state of California to build a 40-gigawatt manufacturing facility and create 600+ advanced manufacturing jobs. - Rapidly scaling from engineering prototypes to early customer deployments with major industry partners. ## Competitive Advantages - **Deep technical moat**: Heron’s core technology is an integrated solid-state transformer (SST) — a fundamental re-architecture of medium-voltage power electronics that is more scalable, software-integrated, and efficient than traditional copper-and-iron transformers. - **Founder pedigree**: CEO Drew Baglino was a 18-year veteran and SVP of Powertrain and Energy at Tesla, where he led development of the 4680 battery cell, Megapack, and built multi-billion-dollar energy and charging businesses. - **Strategic backing**: Backed by a world-class syndicate of climate-tech and deep-tech investors (Breakthrough Energy, a16z, Valor) and advised by Tesla co-founder JB Straubel and former Tesla CFO Zach Kirkhorn. - **Manufacturing-first approach**: Already planning a 40 GW U.S. manufacturing facility with state incentives secured, signaling a focus on high-volume, cost-competitive production from the start. ## Strategic Focus - **Scale manufacturing**: Building out a large-scale U.S. factory to meet demand from AI data centers and renewable energy projects. - **Commercial deployment**: Moving from engineering prototypes to delivering integrated solutions with strategic partners like LG Energy Solution Vertech. - **Debottleneck the grid**: Targeting the critical infrastructure bottleneck where traditional transformers and grid equipment cannot keep pace with surging electricity demand from AI, electrification, and renewables. ## Why Work Here - **High-impact mission**: Work on foundational hardware that directly enables the energy transition and AI infrastructure — systems that will be deployed and operated for decades. - **Engineering culture**: Values rapid iteration ("build, test, learn"), first-principles reasoning, and cross-functional collaboration across hardware, software, manufacturing, and operations. - **Ownership and autonomy**: Strong emphasis on taking accountability for outcomes, not just tasks, and working across team boundaries to deliver an impeccable product. - **Transparent and direct**: Culture prizes clear communication, honest feedback, and progress over posturing — "no defensiveness, no ego." - **Location and flexibility**: Based in Scotts Valley, California (near Santa Cruz/Silicon Valley), with a presence in Canada. The work is highly hands-on (hardware, lab, factory), so on-site presence is expected for engineering roles. - **Growth trajectory**: Explosive headcount growth (975% YoY) and 58 open roles across electrical, mechanical, manufacturing, software, and supply chain disciplines — offering significant career acceleration for early hires. - **Notable perks**: Opportunity to work alongside a team with deep expertise from Tesla, Meta, and KKR, with direct mentorship from a proven founder. ## Sources 1. [heronpower.com](https://heronpower.com/) 2. [heronpower.com/about](https://heronpower.com/about) 3. [heronpower.com/careers](https://heronpower.com/careers) 4. [linkedin.com/company/heron-power-electronics](https://www.linkedin.com/company/heron-power-electronics) 5. [jobs.ashbyhq.com/heron-power](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/heron-power) ## Other roles at Heron Power - [Material Planner](https://feeny.ai/job/material-planner-heron-power-scotts-valley-xr8q6af4zz5x) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Logistics Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/logistics-manager-heron-power-scotts-valley-tkxfm3nypady) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Senior/Staff Automation Controls Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-automation-controls-engineer-heron-power-scotts-valley-x136v893cm16) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Power Electronics Controls Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/power-electronics-controls-engineer-heron-power-scotts-valley-6dq80q3tn0wg) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Senior/Staff Embedded Software Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-embedded-software-engineer-heron-power-scotts-valley-cd7y4mazz2nf) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Senior/Staff Hardware Design Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-staff-hardware-design-engineer-heron-power-scotts-valley-tqn8rrmhpfp7) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Hardware Applications Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/hardware-applications-engineer-heron-power-scotts-valley-kfxvw2cs0bwy) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Product Test Engineer, Energy Storage Applications](https://feeny.ai/job/product-test-engineer-energy-storage-applications-heron-power-scotts-valley-jpvdhkdth144) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Power Electronics Test & Validation Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/power-electronics-test-validation-engineer-heron-power-scotts-valley-nmstx1yamf2z) — Scotts Valley, CA - [Systems Integration Engineer, SST & BESS Applications](https://feeny.ai/job/systems-integration-engineer-sst-bess-applications-heron-power-scotts-valley-vgbkn6jhna14) — Scotts Valley, CA