Safety Test Engineer - Robot Arms

Description

Safety verification and validation work on robot arms, with a focus on proving that safety functions behave as specified in real use.

The team builds and tests collaborative robot systems, and this role sits between safety, firmware, robotics and application engineers.

Responsibilities

• Design and run test cases for robot safety functions such as emergency stop, protective stop, safe torque off, safety-rated speed and position limits, safety zones and collaborative operation modes.
• Measure safety behaviour in practice, including stopping time and distance, speed and separation monitoring, power and force limiting, and contact force and pressure.
• Test safety-related interfaces: safety I/O, safety PLC and controller communication, and fieldbus safety protocols.
• Run fault-injection and negative tests, such as sensor failures, communication loss, power interruptions and invalid configurations, and confirm the system reaches a safe state.
• Use knowledge of mechanical, electrical and control systems to predict failure modes and build tests that expose integration problems early.
• Support compliance with standards including ISO 10218-1/-2, ISO/TS 15066, ISO 13849, IEC 61508, IEC 62061 and IEC 60204-1.
• Keep requirements, risk assessment results, test cases, results and findings traceable to each other.
• Write and maintain test plans, test reports and verification evidence for the safety case and for audits by certification bodies such as TÜV.
• Provide the testing view for risk assessments, FMEA and hazard analyses.
• Run safety regression testing across software and firmware releases and hardware variants.
• Build and maintain automated and semi-automated test benches, measurement equipment and scripts, integrated into CI/CD pipelines where practical.
• Investigate failures, lead root-cause analysis and report safety-relevant findings clearly to stakeholders.
• Log defects, track them and follow each one to closure.
• Mentor junior engineers and take part in sprint planning, estimation and retrospectives.
• Improve safety test methods, coverage and tooling.

Requirements

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Mechatronics, Robotics, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Computer Science or a related field.
• 5+ years of testing, validation or verification of safety-critical mechatronic or robotic systems. Industrial automation or collaborative robot experience is preferred.
• Solid understanding of robot arm basics: kinematics, joint versus Cartesian motion, reference frames, safety limits and collaborative operation principles.
• Working knowledge of functional safety concepts and standards, including Performance Level, SIL, safety architectures and safe states.
• Hands-on work with safety hardware and test equipment: safety PLCs or controllers, safety I/O, force and pressure measurement devices, oscilloscopes and data loggers.
• Experience writing structured test specifications, reports and traceability documents.
• Scripting in Python and/or Java. Familiarity with test automation such as Cucumber/BDD or Selenium, and with Git, is a plus.
• Experience with CI/CD tools such as GitLab and with agile, cross-functional teams.
• Ability to coordinate work across teams and mentor others.
• Fluent English is required. German is a plus.
• Experience supporting CE marking or third-party safety certification is nice to have.
• Knowledge of cybersecurity for safety systems is nice to have.
• Experience with ROS or other robotics middleware is nice to have.