Engineering owns the work, not the slide deck.
Design, tooling, process, coating, assembly, and metrology share one floor and one program owner. Decisions are made by the people who carry the consequence — not by a layer of management above them.
Careers
Build polymer optics with the people who own the process end to end.
Sandia hires for substance: documented process discipline, real optical evidence, and the discipline to escalate a problem before it propagates. If that matches how you work, the open roles below may be a fit.
Why work here
Three concrete reasons
Programs you can point at.
Sandia ships precision polymer optics into automotive cabin sensing, medical imaging, and tactical and defense sensor systems. The work is technical, the customers are sophisticated, and the failure modes are real.
Documented process, not folk knowledge.
Process windows, release criteria, and audit-grade evidence are documented because programs depend on them — and because new hires deserve to inherit a system, not a tribal lore stack.
Open roles
8 open roles
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM
Assembly Operator
Build lens-stack and optomechanical subassemblies to optical-bench acceptance criteria — not just dimensional tolerances.
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM (hybrid)
Director of Business Development
Open programs in automotive sensing, medical devices, and tactical/defense for a polymer-optics manufacturer that wins on process, not on marketing.
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM (hybrid)
Marketing Operations Specialist
Run the engineering-led marketing operation behind sandiaoptical.com, the SPIE/Photonics West cadence, and the engineer-to-engineer content program.
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM
Mold Process Technician
Own the process window for optical injection molding — from first shots through PPAP through SOP — on all-electric presses molding precision polymer optics.
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM
Molding Operator
Run all-electric optical injection molding presses to the documented process window — and keep the lot-traceability and first-article record clean for every shift.
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM
Quality Control Technician
Run incoming, in-process, and final inspection for polymer optical components — on the bench, in the metrology lab, and against the program's release evidence.
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM
Senior Quality Department Manager
Own Sandia's quality system end-to-end — the documented certifications and registration posture, customer audit readiness — and the people who run it day to day. (See the About page for current certification specifics; those are tracked as client-confirmation placeholders.)
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Full-time · Albuquerque, NM
Tooling Engineer
Design and shepherd optical injection mold tooling — gate strategy, cavity layout, cooling, and venting — for polymer optics that need to hit form, birefringence, and PPAP on the first SOP.
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Benefits
What we offer
- Medical, dental, and vision coverage with employer contribution.
- Retirement plan with employer match.
- Paid time off, paid holidays, and paid sick leave.
- Continuing-education and certification support for technical roles.
- On-site parking; coffee that engineers actually drink.
Specific contribution percentages, match formulas, and accrual rates are confirmed at offer.
Equal employment opportunity
EEO statement
Sandia Optical Systems is an equal opportunity employer. We consider qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, protected veteran status, age, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local law. Defense-program roles may require ITAR eligibility per United States Munitions List and DDTC requirements.
Don't see a role that fits? Email us anyway.
Tell us what you'd want to work on at a polymer-optics manufacturer and what you'd bring. We read every introduction and respond when there is a real match.