CNC Machinist

About Kovari

Kovari develops frontier technology to transform physical businesses. We partner with established operators to change how they run, and we build and operate businesses of our own through our subsidiaries.

We are a small team of builders, operators, and researchers. We deploy on site, alongside the businesses we serve, and iterate in the field. We have raised over $6M from leading investors.

We are based in San Francisco and work in person.

The Role

You will own machining for our robots: turn drawings into precise parts on our in-house CNC (Haas VF-2SS and related equipment), keep the shop running, and feed the mechanical team with parts that survive real operations. You program it, set it up, cut it, inspect it, and fix what comes back from the field.

This is not a pure production-cell role. You work next to engineers iterating designs daily: tight lead times, prototype one-offs and short runs, aluminum and steel, and parts that have to fit actuators, drivetrains, and structures that take a beating in hotels and other live sites.

What You'll Do

• Program and operate CNC mills (Haas VF-2SS and similar): CAM, setups, fixtures, tool selection, and proven processes

• Machine robot parts from engineering drawings and CAD: brackets, plates, housings, shafts, linkages, and custom fixtures

• Own shop workflow: material, tooling, workholding, inspection, and turnaround so engineers are never waiting on parts

• Inspect to print: calipers, micrometers, height gauges, and basic GD&T; catch bad parts before they hit the robot

• Maintain the machines and shop: tooling inventory, consumables, cleanliness, and basic preventive maintenance

• Partner with mechanical engineers on DFM: suggest edits that cut faster, hold tighter, or assemble cleaner

• Support quick-turn prototypes and small production batches as the robot design iterates

What You Bring

• Hands-on CNC milling experience (Haas preferred): setup, tooling, and making good parts without babysitting

• CAM fluency (Fusion, Mastercam, or similar) and comfort reading drawings with GD&T

• Strong metrology instincts: you measure, you know when a part is in or out

• Experience in aluminum and steel; comfort with one-offs and short runs, not only high-volume production

• Bonus: lathe, welding, manual mill, or fixture design; robotics / FSAE / combat robotics / similar shop background

• Bias toward action: program fast, cut, inspect, fix the process when something drifts

Values

• Pace of learning trumps everything.

• Relentless refinement of our craft.

• Low ego, high ownership.

• All-in on the mission. We work in person, and this isn't a 9-to-5.