Principal Mechanical Engineer

Your role as a Principal Mechanical Engineer involves crucial technical leadership within the organisation. You will:

• Take full responsibility for the design, development, and lifecycle support of mechanical modules and sub-assemblies, delivering safe, compliant solutions aligned with Edwards’ Product Commercialisation Process and Engineering Change Processes.
• Set clear engineering specification targets and ensure rigorous compliance with applicable international, national, and industry safety standards, always placing product safety and customer trust first.
• Approve and be accountable for the verification of designs, ensuring they conform to relevant design standards and safety reviews, including being an authorised checker and releaser of engineering documentation, including mechanical drawings to BS8888 and Pipe & Instrumentation Diagrams (P&IDs).
• Deliver results through collaboration, managing sub-assembly design activities to achieve agreed quality, cost, and schedule commitments in close partnership with project and cross-functional teams.
• Demonstrate accountability for delivery, ensuring timely, accurate, and complete technical documentation to support verification, validation, and product release.
• Lead by example in risk management, contributing expert input to HAZOP, DFMEA, LOPA, and risk analyses, ensuring actions are embedded in testing, commissioning, and acceptance plans.
• Oversee various technical projects as assigned, taking responsibility for technical performance and maturity of solutions, with product safety foremost in mind.
• Develop people and capability, providing coaching, mentoring, and technical guidance to engineers, and managing engineering teams when required to promote knowledge sharing and continuous improvement.
• Drive engineering excellence through interaction and innovation, leading technical discussions, communicating priorities clearly, and making sound, balanced decisions that optimise safety, performance, cost, and long-term value.

To succeed, you will need:

• Engineering Degree (Bachelor’s minimum, essential), master’s degree or demonstrable equivalent experience at senior technical level (desirable).
• Chartered Engineer (CEng) or demonstrable progress and commitment toward chartership with a recognised engineering institution (desirable).
• Extensive, senior-level experience in mechanical engineering and system design within complex, high-reliability engineering environments (essential).
• Proven track record of technical leadership across the full product lifecycle, from concept development and requirements definition through detailed design, verification, validation, and sustaining engineering (essential).
• Deep experience working within regulated, compliance-driven industries, with authoritative knowledge of product safety, regulatory frameworks, and applicable international standards (essential).
• Experience using mechanical CAD software (Catia V6 3DX, and/or other drafting tools) (essential).
• Experience using P&ID drafting software (AutoCAD, and/or other drafting tools) (desirable).
• Proficient in Microsoft Office (essential).
• Ability to work collaboratively in a team environment and contribute to cross-functional projects (essential).
• Strong communication skills, both written and verbal, with the ability to influence and negotiate with partners across the business using exceptional soft skills to work with people and teams to discover and share key information (essential).

In return, we offer a culture of trust and accountability, lifelong learning and career growth, and comprehensive compensation and benefits.

This role offers a hybrid working arrangement, allowing you to split your time between working remotely and being on-site in Bristol, United Kingdom (GB).

About Edwards: Edwards is a leading developer and manufacturer of sophisticated vacuum products, exhaust management systems, and related value-added services. Edwards solutions are integral to manufacturing processes for semiconductors, flat panel displays, LEDs, and solar cells. They are also used within an increasingly diverse range of industrial processes including power, glass and other coating applications; steel and other metallurgy; pharmaceutical and chemical; and for scientific instruments in a wide range of R&D applications. Edwards has over 4,000 employees worldwide engaged in the design, manufacture, and support of high technology vacuum and exhaust management equipment, with state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities in Europe, Asia, and North America.