Robotics Manager

Role Overview

Strategy and Program Leadership

• Lead the organization’s robotics strategy and roadmap.
• Identify, evaluate, and prioritize automation opportunities based on strategic, operational, technical, financial, safety, and workforce considerations.
• Build and manage the robotics project portfolio.
• Lead implementation programs from concept through production deployment.
• Define project scope, requirements, timelines, budgets, resources, and success criteria.
• Manage multidisciplinary robotics teams and allocate resources across projects.
• Recruit, develop, coach, and retain robotics talent.
• Prepare business cases, manage budgets, track spending, and monitor return on investment.

Technology and Integration

• Evaluate industrial, collaborative, mobile, autonomous, vision, storage, picking, and inspection robotics technologies.
• Lead vendor evaluations, demonstrations, proofs of concept, technical due diligence, and solution recommendations.
• Define functional and technical requirements, including throughput, accuracy, payload, cycle time, availability, safety, integration, and environmental needs.
• Integrate robotics with manufacturing equipment, conveyors, ERP, WMS, MES, TMS, PLCs, sensors, vision systems, IoT platforms, and cloud systems.
• Coordinate robot programming, motion control, PLCs, computer vision, machine learning, path planning, navigation, sensor integration, and human-machine interfaces.

Testing, Deployment, and Operations

• Develop testing protocols and coordinate factory acceptance testing, site acceptance testing, commissioning, and corrective actions.
• Manage pilot deployments, collect operational data, analyze results, and recommend scale-up, redesign, or discontinuation.
• Coordinate site readiness, installation, electrical, mechanical, software, network, and facility requirements.
• Develop cutover plans, minimize operational disruption, and ensure readiness before go-live.
• Create standard operating procedures and technical documentation, and train operators, technicians, engineers, and maintenance teams.
• Establish preventive and corrective maintenance, spare-parts, asset-management, reliability, and equipment-health programs.

Performance, Safety, and Improvement

• Monitor availability, utilization, throughput, cycle time, downtime, failure rates, repair times, accuracy, productivity, and other robotics KPIs.
• Optimize robotic processes, paths, movement, utilization, reliability, and system performance.
• Use telemetry, analytics, and machine learning where appropriate to support predictive maintenance and monitoring.
• Evaluate and support computer vision, autonomous navigation, localization, obstacle detection, fleet management, and dynamic routing applications.
• Ensure compliance with applicable safety standards and company requirements, conduct risk assessments, and establish safety zones, guarding, and emergency stops.

Candidate Profile

• Have significant experience in robotics, industrial automation, controls engineering, mechatronics, manufacturing automation, warehouse automation, autonomous systems, or a closely related discipline.
• Combine engineering expertise, project management, commercial thinking, operational understanding, and people leadership.
• Have proven experience managing robotics or automation projects and multidisciplinary technical teams.
• Have strong problem-solving and root-cause-analysis capabilities.

Technical and Professional Skills

• Understand robotics systems, automation technologies, PLCs, sensors, actuators, motion control, machine vision, industrial networks, and robotics software.
• Have experience with commissioning, testing, deployment, operational-system integration, preventive maintenance, and predictive maintenance.
• Understand machinery and robotics safety standards.
• Have strong budget, business-case, automation ROI, stakeholder-management, and communication skills.
• Experience with CAD, simulation, robotics programming, PLC, SCADA, MES, WMS, or related engineering tools is advantageous.
• Experience with ROS/ROS2, Python, C++, MATLAB, AI, computer vision, machine learning, or autonomous navigation is advantageous.
• Power BI or other analytics tools, industrial cybersecurity, and Arabic proficiency are advantageous.
• Have strong Microsoft Office skills and good written and verbal English communication.

Education

• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in robotics, mechatronics, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, automation engineering, computer engineering, computer science, or a related technical discipline.

Work Arrangement

• The role is full-time and fully remote in the United Arab Emirates.