CAD/CAM Programmer
Foundational Industries · San Francisco
Foundational Industries · SF Bay Area · Full-Time
About Foundational
Foundational is building a network of AI-native, autonomous factories for modern contract manufacturing — reshoring critical supply chains so companies can produce high-quality products domestically, quickly, and at competitive cost. Recent breakthroughs in robotics and physical AI have shifted autonomous manufacturing from theoretical to deployable. We are operationalizing these capabilities at scale during a decisive decade for American industrial leadership.
WHO — Who Thrives Here
At Foundational, we build with people who want to own something. Work that matters, in an environment where what you ship is what counts.
The people who thrive here:
Take ownership before they are asked. They see the gap and close it.
Operate with a high degree of judgment. We move fast, and good judgment travels farther than a playbook.
Communicate directly — concise, clear, and candid, especially when stakes are high.
Hold a high bar for themselves first, then for everyone around them.
Are genuinely energized by hard problems in physical, real-world environments. Energized — not just interested.
Stay effective when things are ambiguous, changing, or under pressure. That is the job.
Care more about outcomes than status. No ego, no politics, no rigid thinking.
Feel some personal connection to the mission. Reindustrializing America is not a tagline here — it is the work.
Are resilient and willing to change direction. We will pivot. The job is solving the problem, not defending the plan.
This is a place for people who want to build something that has never existed before and leave a clear mark on it.
MISSION
You own the bridge between the shop floor and the software team. This role exists because great CAM automation can only be built by someone who has run the programs, argued with the post-processor, and watched chips fly. You will turn deep machining expertise into production-grade automated CAM software — and build the team and systems to keep it improving. If this role is empty, we are asking software engineers to guess what machinists need, and shipping code that does not hold up in the real world.
WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE IN 6–12 MONTHS
[6 months] You have mapped the highest-value CAM programming workflows and translated them into a prioritized automation roadmap, signed off by engineering and manufacturing leadership.
[6 months] You have shipped at least one working prototype automation — toolpath generation, feature recognition, or post-processing — using a CAM software API, validated against real part geometries.
[6 months] You have defined what "production-ready automated output" means for Foundational: the criteria, test cases, and acceptance benchmarks the software team builds and runs against.
[12 months] You lead a cross-functional team of CAM programmers, machinists, and software engineers delivering the CAM automation roadmap on schedule.
[12 months] Automated CAM outputs are validated against realistic machining scenarios and trusted enough to run on production machines with no manual re-work.
[12 months] The product feedback loop is closed — you are gathering input from CAM programmers and machinists on the floor and translating it into feature improvements on a regular cycle.
SKILLS
You have 3+ years programming parts in Mastercam, Fusion 360, Siemens NX CAM, hyperMILL, or a comparable package — on real production jobs, not tutorials.
You know 3-axis, 4-axis, and 5-axis milling, turning, and mill-turn toolpath strategies from the inside: where the defaults fail and why.
You can spec fixturing, select tooling, and set feeds and speeds without looking them up.
You can take a manual CAM workflow you run every day, break it into discrete steps, and write down exactly what a machine would need to do each one autonomously.
You can write a product requirement that a software engineer can act on — specific, scoped, and unambiguous.
You communicate clearly at the boundary between the shop floor and a software team: translating machining constraints into engineering requirements and back.
Plus at least one of:
You have scripted or automated something in a CAM environment — an API call, a macro, a template system — even if it was scrappy.
You have defined product requirements, written specs, and shipped features alongside software engineers.
Nice to have:
Experience developing CAM software at an established vendor (Autodesk, Siemens, Open Mind, CNC Software, etc.).
Experience with CAM automation systems: feature recognition, knowledge-based machining, generative or AI-assisted toolpaths, or parametric templates.
Familiarity with a CAM SDK/API — Mastercam .NET API, Autodesk Fusion API, NX Open, or similar.
Exposure to machine learning or AI applied to manufacturing.
Background in a production machine shop or contract manufacturing environment.
Experience with simulation and verification tools such as Vericut.
COMPETENCIES
These are the behavioral patterns that predict success here, in practice, under pressure.
Bias for action — You ship. You iterate. You move toward the hard thing.
Builder mentality — You have operated as a function of one. You are energized by building systems from scratch, and comfortable being the person who figures it out before asking for help.
High standards — You raise the bar rather than match it, and hold yourself to it first.
Systems thinking — You see the whole, not just your piece. You ask how your work connects to what comes before and after it.
Clarity of communication — Direct and concise, especially when it counts.
Collaborative judgment — You read the room, pick your moments, and move people without politics.
WHY FOUNDATIONAL
This is a filter as much as it is an invitation.
We are turning reindustrialization from a talking point into an operating reality. The work is hard, the environment is demanding, and the stakes are real. We compensate with base, bonus, and equity to reflect impact, responsibility, and results — with meaningful upside for the people who help build and scale this company.
For those aligned with the mission and motivated by execution at scale, Foundational offers the opportunity to help define one of the most consequential industrial transformations of the next decade.
Foundational Industries is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees and applicants. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), age, disability, genetic information, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. Foundational complies with all applicable federal, state, and local laws governing nondiscrimination in employment. We evaluate every candidate on what they can do and who they are.
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