Manufacturing Engineer

About the Role

As a Manufacturing Engineer, you will serve as a key technical interface with automotive customers, coordinate customer audits and engineering changes, and support new product introduction and production ramp-up. Working closely with international and local teams, you will provide shop-floor technical support and drive continuous improvement to meet customer requirements and manufacturing targets.

Key Responsibilities

• Customer communication: Serve as the primary technical contact for customers on engineering, manufacturing process and quality matters, ensuring timely responses and effective follow-up on customer requirements and action items.
• Customer visits and technical reviews: Organize and coordinate customer visits, site assessments, technical discussions and project reviews, working with relevant internal teams.
• Customer audit coordination: Lead internal preparation and on-site coordination for customer process audits, potential supplier assessments, production release audits and other customer-specific audits. Provide technical explanations and respond to customer questions during audits.
• Corrective actions and audit closure: Drive cross-functional teams to develop and implement corrective actions in response to customer audit findings, track progress and coordinate closure with customers.
• New product introduction: Participate throughout the new product introduction (NPI) cycle, supporting trial production, production ramp-up and the transition to stable mass production.
• Engineering change management: Manage the shop-floor implementation and validation of engineering changes in accordance with engineering change notices (ECNs). Maintain traceability and ensure compliance with customer specifications and applicable customer notification and approval requirements.
• Shop-floor technical support: Provide manufacturing process and technical support, independently investigate technical issues and work with production, quality and equipment teams to implement effective solutions.
• Process documentation: Maintain and update standard operating procedures (SOPs), process failure mode and effects analyses (PFMEAs), control plans and other relevant process documentation in collaboration with the responsible teams.
• Continuous improvement: Monitor key performance indicators, including first pass yield (FPY) and overall equipment effectiveness (OEE), and apply tools such as 8D, 5 Whys and statistical process control (SPC) to improve process performance and product quality.
• Cross-functional collaboration: Coordinate international and local production, quality, equipment and project teams to meet customer delivery milestones and complete engineering activities on time and to the required quality standards.
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Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree or above in Mechanical Engineering, Automation, Materials Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Automotive Engineering or a related discipline.
• At least three years of experience in manufacturing engineering, process engineering or customer quality engineering (CQE) within the automotive components industry.
• Hands-on experience throughout the NPI cycle, including trial production and production ramp-up, with direct experience working with automotive OEM or Tier 1 customers.
• Sound knowledge of automotive manufacturing processes and equipment operating principles.
• Strong working knowledge of IATF 16949 requirements and automotive quality core tools, particularly APQP, PPAP, PFMEA and Control Plans.
• Familiarity with customer audit processes and requirements, such as VDA 6.3, Formel Q or relevant OEM-specific requirements. Ability to independently coordinate audit preparation, provide on-site technical support and drive corrective actions through to closure.
• Excellent spoken and written English, with the ability to communicate confidently with international customers on business and technical matters.
• German language skills are an advantage, particularly for direct communication with German automotive customers and OEMs.
• A customer-focused approach, strong technical communication skills and the ability to build and maintain trusted customer relationships.
• Strong problem-solving and cross-functional coordination skills, with the ability to respond effectively to on-site issues, work under pressure and drive customer action items through to completion.