Safety Operations Lead

Atoms is building the machines that power the next era of progress.

Over the last decade, software has transformed the digital world. But the physical world, where food is made, minerals are mined, goods are moved, and industries are run, remains far less intelligent, far less efficient, and far more constrained. We’re changing that.

Atoms builds Physical AI— real-world robots for the industries that move civilization forward, starting with food, mining, and transport. Our systems are designed to understand, predict, and control the real world with precision, turning complex physical operations into something more reliable, more scalable, and more productive.

This work requires more than robotics. It requires deep integration across hardware, software, AI, operations, manufacturing, and real estate. We don’t just build machines in a lab. We deploy them into real environments, operate them, learn from them, and improve them until they work at scale.

We are roboticists, engineers, operators, and builders. We believe the next great technology companies will not only transform information, but the physical systems that shape everyday life.

If you want to work on hard problems with real-world impact, join us.

Our safety practice is not a document exercise — it is an operating discipline that has to run at the speed of the fleet. This role owns that discipline. You will stand up and run the operational safety machinery: how we manage incidents, how we train and qualify the people in and around our vehicles, how field events get triaged and routed, and how investigations turn into engineering change. Today these functions exist on a smaller scale. Your job is to make them a coherent system that scales as we add vehicles, routes, and customers.

This is a hands-on role. You will write the next version of most of these processes yourself, run the first dozen investigations yourself, and only then hire against the parts that need scale.

• →6-8+ years in safety operations, fleet safety, transportation safety, or operational risk in a safety-critical domain — commercial trucking, autonomous vehicles, rail, aviation, or industrial operations. 
• →Demonstrated experience leading real incident investigations to root cause and driving corrective actions to closure. We will ask you to walk through specific investigations in detail.
• →Fluency with structured investigation and risk methods — root cause analysis, causal factor charting, human factors analysis, hazard identification — and the judgment to know which one a given event actually warrants.
• →Data-driven by default. You are comfortable working directly with event data: querying it, building your own views, and forming a defensible position from it. SQL and basic scripting are expected; you should not need an analyst to tell you what the fleet is doing.
• →Working knowledge of the US vehicle regulatory environment, — AV-specific reporting such as the NHTSA Standing General Order, FMCSA regulations, hours of service. Familiarity with SAE J3016 levels and ODD concepts.
• →The disposition this work requires: calm under a live incident, rigorous when it would be easier to be reassuring, and willing to be the person who says stop.
• →Willingness to be on-site and on-call. Incidents do not respect business hours.

This role is based in our San Francisco office. Atoms is a company driven by invention and continuous change - we are constantly reimagining our industries, building new products, and refining how we operate. We do our best work together. That’s why all of our office-based teams work onsite, five days a week.

The base salary range for this role is $182,000 - $230,000 per year.

Actual compensation will be determined on an individual basis and may vary depending on experience, skills, and qualifications.

Base salary is just one part of your total rewards package. You may also be eligible for equity awards.

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