Textile Manufacturing Subject Matter Expert – SoftGoods
Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
Operations and Supply Chain
Imagine what you could do here. At Apple, new ideas have a way of becoming extraordinary products, services, and customer experiences very quickly. Bring passion and dedication to your job and there's no telling what you could accomplish. The people here at Apple don’t just create products — they create the kind of wonder that’s revolutionized entire industries. It’s the diversity of those people and their ideas that inspires the innovation that runs through everything we do, from amazing technology to industry-leading environmental efforts. Join Apple, and help us leave the world better than we found it!
In this highly visible role, you will have the opportunity to make a significant impact on Apple Products, and leave a footprint for years to come. We have an opportunity for an accomplished manufacturing engineer to lead development, and ramp for a next generation Apple product.
Our textile manufacturing engineering team enables the mass creation of impossible products. We work in tandem with Apple's renowned designers to develop equipment, processes, measurement technologies, control strategies, information systems, and manufacturing methods that achieve ambitious specifications at extensive production scale. We handle a network of supplier factories worldwide, with responsibility for our partners' delivery to bold schedules. Our focus is on elegant execution of extraordinary industrial designs, resulting in products that thrill our customers.
As an integral part of the SoftGoods Operations team, help create the most amazing SoftGoods products on the planet. Work with Apple’s Industrial Design and Product Design teams to develop highly challenging textiles and finishes on a variety of substrates ranging from synthetic yarns, innovative textiles, to engineered fabrics.
Key Qualifications
- Minimum:
- - 5+ years of textile experiences (preferably in highly cosmetic textiles, e.g., apparel, footwear, consumer electronics) and broad knowledge in textile manufacturing process
- - Solid knowledge on yarn extrusion, yarn post processing, fabric manufacturing technology (weaving, knitting, braiding etc)
- - Excellent understanding of fabric post processing technologies e.g. dyeing, finishing, printing.
- - Hands-on experience in setting up textile manufacturing processes, including equipment selection.
- - Fluent in English, both verbal and written
- Preferred:
- - Experience in new engineered textile development
- - Experience with setting up innovative supply chain for new technologies
- - Expertise in establishing process controls adhering to strict quality specifications
- - Ability to plan, implement, and present results from investigations using statistical analysis and clearly communicate results and recommendations
Description
- Responsible for Researching and setting up new manufacturing technologies for creating highly engineered textile materials.
- Identify the state-of-the-art equipment for yarn and fabric manufacturing, including post processing of textiles, and implementing tighter control of existing finishes.
- Develops, implements, maintains and provide training on textile development and post processing.
- Develop, pilot and scale new engineered textiles for mass production.
- Passion in researching and developing innovative ways of characterizing and testing of textiles including new metrology.
- Support x functional team with failure analysis and trouble shooting of technical issues.
- Identify and lead new innovative methods of continuously improving manufacturing processes.
- Present analysis to key decision makers that will be used to make commercial, operations, and design decisions.
- Effective collaboration with product and industrial design team to understand design intent, and identify pioneering manufacturing technologies for scale up.
- Evaluate supplier capabilities and address shortcomings relative to company needs.
- Drive on-site support in conjunction with multi-functional team members for implementation of manufacturing processes at supplier locations.
- Build relationships with these counterparts and suppliers, and cultivate development of their capabilities and expertise.
- Maintain solid understanding of key process drivers and domain expertise in the technologies to serve as technical resource on project teams.
- Frequent travel expected. (>30%)
- Strong communication and organizational skills with ability to handle projects independently
- Ability to learn quickly, adapt to a constantly evolving environment, and lead projects