Senior Research Engineer, Battery & Digital Manufacturing
Location: Greensboro, North Carolina
Company: Soelect, Inc.
Employment Type: Full Time
About Soelect
Soelect, Inc. is an advanced battery technology company developing next generation lithium metal anodes, advanced electrode manufacturing technologies, and AI enabled material intelligence solutions.
Our technology portfolio includes Lithium-X®, an advanced lithium metal anode platform for high energy density batteries, and Pen-AI™ Material Intelligence, an AI based material intelligence platform designed to convert image derived information into quantitative and actionable material insights.
Soelect is expanding its R&D activities into Digital Twin, virtual factory, smart manufacturing, autonomous manufacturing, and AI integrated battery production systems.
We are seeking a Senior Research Engineer, Battery & Digital Manufacturing who can connect battery science and manufacturing with emerging digital technologies and lead multidisciplinary R&D programs from concept through demonstration.
Position Overview
The Senior Research Engineer will lead and support advanced R&D programs involving:
- Battery materials and electrochemical systems
- Lithium metal and next generation battery technologies
- Electrode manufacturing
- Digital Twin technology
- Virtual factory development
- Smart manufacturing
- AI enabled manufacturing
- Manufacturing process modeling and optimization
- Closed loop and autonomous manufacturing
- Federal and commercial R&D programs
This is not a conventional battery research position.
The successful candidate will work at the intersection of battery science, manufacturing engineering, data, AI, process modeling, and Digital Twin technology.
The engineer will work closely with Soelect's battery scientists, process engineers, AI development team, external research institutions, customers, and government partners to develop next generation intelligent battery manufacturing technologies.
Key ResponsibilitiesBattery Materials and Process Engineering
- Lead and support R&D activities involving lithium metal batteries, lithium ion batteries, solid state batteries, electrode materials, and advanced battery manufacturing.
- Design experiments to understand relationships among materials, manufacturing parameters, electrode structures, and electrochemical performance.
- Analyze electrode properties including thickness, loading, uniformity, morphology, porosity, surface characteristics, and other material or process related parameters.
- Establish relationships between manufacturing conditions, material characteristics, cell performance, and manufacturing quality.
- Support development and scale up of advanced electrode and lithium metal manufacturing processes.
- Apply statistical and physics based approaches to analyze manufacturing variability and identify critical process parameters.
Digital Twin and Virtual Factory Development
- Develop Digital Twin concepts for battery material and electrode manufacturing processes.
- Build relationships between physical manufacturing equipment, process parameters, material characteristics, quality measurements, and virtual process models.
- Support development of virtual representations of manufacturing equipment, process flows, materials, and production environments.
- Integrate experimental and manufacturing data into Digital Twin frameworks.
- Develop models capable of predicting manufacturing outcomes based on process and material inputs.
- Support development of virtual factory environments for process simulation, optimization, equipment interaction, and manufacturing scenario evaluation.
- Compare predicted Digital Twin outputs with physical experimental and manufacturing results.
- Develop strategies for continuously improving virtual models using physical manufacturing data.
Smart and Autonomous Manufacturing
- Develop advanced manufacturing concepts integrating process equipment, machine vision, material intelligence, Digital Twin models, and manufacturing control systems.
- Support integration of Pen-AI™ Material Intelligence with manufacturing equipment and process data.
- Develop relationships among image derived material descriptors, manufacturing parameters, material properties, and downstream battery performance.
- Participate in development of real time manufacturing quality assessment and process optimization methodologies.
- Develop frameworks for converting manufacturing and material intelligence into actionable process decisions.
- Support development of closed loop manufacturing architectures in which material and process information can be used to dynamically optimize manufacturing conditions.
- Investigate advanced control approaches including Model Predictive Control and other data driven or physics informed manufacturing control methodologies.
- Contribute to Soelect's long term development of increasingly autonomous battery manufacturing systems.
Modeling, Data, and AI Integration
- Work with AI and software engineers to integrate physical manufacturing knowledge into data driven models.
- Develop physics based, empirical, statistical, or hybrid models describing battery manufacturing processes.
- Analyze relationships among process parameters, material descriptors, manufacturing quality, and electrochemical performance.
- Support development of physics informed and data driven predictive models.
- Define technically meaningful input and output parameters for AI and Digital Twin models.
- Evaluate model accuracy against experimental measurements and physical manufacturing data.
- Translate battery science and manufacturing knowledge into engineering requirements for AI, software, and Digital Twin development.
Research and Technology Development
- Identify emerging technologies relevant to next generation battery manufacturing.
- Develop new research concepts involving battery materials, Digital Twin technology, AI, smart manufacturing, and autonomous manufacturing.
- Design and execute experiments to validate new manufacturing concepts.
- Analyze experimental data and communicate technical conclusions.
- Prepare technical reports, research presentations, invention disclosures, and supporting documentation.
- Contribute to intellectual property development and patent activities.
- Support technical publications and conference presentations when appropriate.
Program and Project Management
The Senior Research Engineer will also play an important role in managing multidisciplinary R&D programs.
Responsibilities include:
- Lead technical workstreams for internal, customer funded, and federally funded research programs.
- Develop technical objectives, Statements of Work, milestones, schedules, and deliverables.
- Coordinate activities among scientists, engineers, software developers, universities, national laboratories, customers, and government collaborators.
- Track technical progress, schedules, risks, budgets, milestones, and deliverables.
- Lead technical meetings and program reviews.
- Prepare technical progress reports and presentations.
- Identify technical risks and develop appropriate mitigation strategies.
- Support proposal development for new government and commercial R&D programs.
- Translate research concepts into executable engineering programs.
- Drive projects from initial concept through experimental validation, prototype demonstration, and manufacturing implementation.
Federal Research Programs
The successful candidate may participate in research programs involving organizations such as:
- U.S. Department of Defense
- U.S. Department of Energy
- DARPA
- U.S. Air Force
- U.S. Army
- U.S. Navy
- National laboratories
- Universities and other research institutions
Responsibilities may include technical proposal development, experimental planning, milestone management, technical reporting, government program reviews, and coordination with external research partners.
Required Qualifications
- Master's degree or Ph.D. in Materials Science, Chemical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Chemistry, Physics, Manufacturing Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
- Strong technical background in battery materials, battery manufacturing, electrochemistry, advanced materials, or related technologies.
- Minimum 5 years of relevant industrial, research, or engineering experience.
- Strong understanding of experimental design, data analysis, and engineering problem solving.
- Ability to understand manufacturing processes and connect physical phenomena with quantitative models.
- Experience managing multidisciplinary technical projects.
- Strong technical writing and presentation skills.
- Ability to communicate effectively with scientists, engineers, software developers, management, customers, and external research partners.
- Ability to independently lead technical projects while working effectively within multidisciplinary teams.
Preferred Qualifications
Experience in several of the following areas is highly desirable:
- Lithium metal batteries
- Lithium ion batteries
- Solid state batteries
- Battery electrode materials
- Electrode manufacturing
- Roll to roll manufacturing
- Dry electrode processing
- Battery cell fabrication and electrochemical characterization
- Digital Twin development
- Virtual factory or manufacturing simulation
- Smart manufacturing
- Industry 4.0 manufacturing systems
- AI enabled manufacturing
- Machine vision
- Manufacturing data analytics
- Physics based modeling
- Physics informed machine learning
- Process simulation
- Model Predictive Control
- Closed loop process control
- Autonomous manufacturing
- Manufacturing execution systems
- Process equipment integration
- Federal R&D programs
- SBIR or STTR programs
- DoD or DOE research programs
- Technical proposal development
- Program and project management
Experience with programming, modeling, or engineering tools such as Python, MATLAB, COMSOL, ANSYS, MATLAB Simulink, CAD, process simulation software, or Digital Twin platforms is highly desirable.
Ideal Candidate
We are looking for someone who thinks beyond conventional battery R&D.
The ideal candidate understands that the future of battery manufacturing will increasingly connect:
Materials → Process → Equipment → Data → Material Intelligence → Digital Twin → Process Control → Autonomous Manufacturing
This individual should be capable of understanding the physical science of battery materials while also seeing how manufacturing data, AI, modeling, and Digital Twin technologies can be integrated into a unified manufacturing intelligence framework.
The successful candidate should be intellectually curious, technically rigorous, highly organized, and comfortable leading research in areas where established solutions may not yet exist.
Why Join Soelect
This position provides an opportunity to work at the convergence of next generation battery technology, artificial intelligence, Digital Twin technology, and advanced manufacturing.
Rather than working on only one component of battery development, the Senior Research Engineer will have the opportunity to participate in building an integrated technology platform connecting physical battery manufacturing with digital intelligence and autonomous process control.
The position will work directly with company leadership, internal R&D teams, external research institutions, commercial partners, and U.S. Government organizations.
For an engineer interested in helping define how future battery factories will be designed, modeled, monitored, and autonomously controlled, this position offers a unique multidisciplinary research environment.
Soelect, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Employment decisions are based on qualifications, merit, and business needs without regard to legally protected characteristics.
Job Type: Full-time
Pay: $78,000.00 - $99,000.00 per year
Benefits:
- 401(k) matching
- Dental insurance
- Flexible schedule
- Health insurance
- Life insurance
- Paid time off
- Vision insurance
Education:
Language:
- Korean or Chinese (Required)
Work Location: In person
