---
title: 'Mechatronics Engineer at Innate'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/mechatronics-engineer-innate-bay-area-b7n8d6z7trdv'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-13'
---

# Mechatronics Engineer at Innate

- **Company:** Innate
- **Location:** Bay Area
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-03-24
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-13
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/innate/df4e2f82-2039-4496-8c60-3ea14045eed1

## Job description

## Who we are

Before the PC, there used to be a time where computing was locked inside big corporations. But thanks to hackers of Silicon Valley, everyone now has a computer and can develop for it. The same should happen for robotics. We're building a platform that makes it accessible: the PC of robotics. An intuitive, open, affordable general-purpose robot for everyone. If you're going to work on something crazy hard, it might as well matter. We're a small team that cares: about the problem, about the people using our robots, and about building a product that will still mean something years from now. We are our own users.

## What we're looking for

A generalist mechatronics engineer who has built and shipped before and feels confident working on a mass consumer product. This role covers a lot of ground. On any given day you might be laying out a PCB, designing a mechanical part, and writing firmware. If your ideal job is owning one narrow thing and perfecting it over years, we're probably not a fit. If that description sounds limiting to you, keep reading. The core stuff that actually excites us:

- PCB design, high-speed digital and power electronics
- CAD & rapid prototyping.
- Firmware: embedded C, microcontrollers
- Software: You can code and debug in C / Python

Things that we prefer to see:

- Experience with manufacturing processes — CNC machining, sheet metal, injection molding
- You've touched RF or high-speed signal integrity work
- You've ordered parts, managed a BOM, navigated a supply chain
- FPGAs are a real bonus

DO NOT censure yourself if you don't meet all of these requirements, we look for fast-learners more than anything else.

The kind of person you are •⁠ ⁠You are energized by hard problems, not intimidated by them •⁠ ⁠You are driven to build things for the real world •⁠ ⁠Who you're building with with matters as much as what you're building •⁠ ⁠You value dynamism, new problems every week

## What you'll work on

Designing and building the physical systems that make our robots work — electronics, mechanics, firmware, and everything in between. Think about and design the product, with the rest of the team, and stay close to customers' needs.

## About Innate

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Innate develops personal AI robots that are open, programmable, and teachable, enabling anyone to train physical skills in under 30 minutes.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Pre-Seed, Y Combinator Fall 2024)
- **Headquarters**: Palo Alto, California, United States
- **Founded**: 2024
- **Founders**: Axel Peytavin (CEO) and Vignesh Anand

## Core Business
- Primary industry: Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Consumer Hardware
- Target customers: Builders, developers, and early adopters (B2C for personal robots; B2B for platform/agent licensing)
- Mission or purpose statement: "Unlock the power of robots for everyone" [linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/innate-bot)

## Products & Services
- **MARS (robot)**: A general-purpose personal robot shipping with the BASIC programmable foundation agent. Features a 5+1 DOF arm, onboard NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano (8GB), stereo RGB camera, 2D LiDAR, moving head, and extension ports. Runs an open agentic OS that can be programmed with prompts, tools, and physical demonstrations. Pre-order price $1,999 (second batch) [innate.bot](https://www.innate.bot/).
- **BASIC (agentic OS)**: The AI brain that orchestrates multiple models (including GPT, Gemini, Claude, Llama via Groq) for real-time manipulation, navigation, reasoning, and planning. Completely teachable via chat, prompts, and teleoperation. Includes an SDK and a data pipeline for training new physical skills [ycombinator.com](https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/innate).
- **Maurice (first product)**: A mobile robot with a trainable arm designed for builders. Learns spaces, remembers context, and autonomously performs tasks like security patrol. Training a new skill takes under 30 minutes of data collection [innate.bot](https://www.innate.bot/about).

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed (private startup)
- **Key Metric**: Total funding $500,000 (Pre-Seed round, closed December 4, 2024, led by Y Combinator with 2 investors) [linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/innate-bot)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Y Combinator (lead investor), Nicolas Dessaigne (YC partner), and individual backers [ycombinator.com](https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/innate)
- **Growth Signals**: Headcount grew 33% YoY (from 3 to 4 currently, with a team of 7 during YC batch). Active GitHub organization and growing Discord community. Pre-orders live for MARS.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Open, programmable platform**: First robot shipping with a programmable foundation agent. Hardware and software are open-source and extendable – users can add skills, sensors, and tools.
- **Affordability**: At $1,999 (second batch), MARS is significantly cheaper than comparable research or industrial robots.
- **Rapid skill training**: Physical skills can be taught in under 30 minutes using teleoperation, making robotics accessible to non-experts.
- **State-of-the-art AI integration**: Combines frontier LLMs (GPT, Claude, Gemini, Llama) with custom transformers for real-time manipulation and navigation, all orchestrated by a multi-agent system.

## Strategic Focus
- Current priorities: shipping first robots to early builders, collecting teleoperation data to improve the AI brain, expanding the community of developers, and developing a larger robot that can reach countertops.
- Long-term goal: create a general-purpose personal robot platform for everyone, where skills and behaviors are easily shared – akin to the early PC ecosystem [ycombinator.com](https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/innate).

## Why Work Here
- Culture: "We love working together. We hold each other's abilities in high regard and promote a culture of collaboration and excellence." The founders seek "talented misfits who want to do their best work inventing a new kind of platform" [innate.bot/about](https://www.innate.bot/about). Degrees don’t matter – skill, creativity, and drive are valued.
- Team: Small, high-impact team of 4-7 people (50% technical, including founders with backgrounds from Stanford HCI, Archer, The Ocean Cleanup). Work spans robotics, AI, and human-computer interaction.
- Location: Palo Alto/Silicon Valley – on-site likely, with a maker-oriented environment. No explicit remote/hybrid policy stated.
- Perks: Early equity, ownership of novel general-purpose hardware/software, and a chance to shape the future of personal robotics.

## Sources
1. [innate.bot](https://www.innate.bot/)
2. [linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/innate-bot)
3. [innate.bot/about](https://www.innate.bot/about)
4. [ycombinator.com](https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/innate)
5. [github.com](https://github.com/innate-inc)

## Other roles at Innate

- [Marketing Intern](https://feeny.ai/job/marketing-intern-innate-bay-area-00kw9r6e4q43) — Bay Area
- [Operations Lead / Chief of Staff](https://feeny.ai/job/operations-lead-chief-of-staff-innate-bay-area-fscshe2qh7xx) — Bay Area
- [Open Application](https://feeny.ai/job/open-application-innate-bay-area-bbgwkc3w3pt5) — Bay Area
- [Mechatronics Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/mechatronics-engineer-monumental-amsterdam-j6k6jk92a95s) — Amsterdam, Netherlands
- [Mechatronics Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/mechatronics-engineer-wing-palo-alto-bqkgq4bgmk8d) — Palo Alto, CA
- [Mechatronics Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/mechatronics-engineer-hadrian-automation-los-angeles-fxaxx9j25k12) — Los Angeles, CA