Project and Maintenance Engineer in Batavia

Job Description

Savor Foods Limited is a Series A stage startup pursuing transformational technology to produce high-quality, healthy, and affordable foods, carbon neutrally. We are taking an extremely ambitious bet in the climate fight and we're looking for someone who shares our passion for the mission to build a more sustainable and just food system.

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We're looking for a hands-on mechanical engineer — or a millwright/mechanic with the engineering chops to back it up — to be our on-the-ground problem solver as we scale up a novel production process. This is a wide-open, field-first role: some days you're walking the floor with a vendor to scope a repair, some days you're playing GC on a small capital project, and some days you're at a CAD screen turning a field sketch into a proper isometric. You'll have leadership and engineering support above you, so you won't be building this alone — but you will be the person who makes things actually get fixed, installed, and running.

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Responsibilities

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Field and hands-on work

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• Run field walks to scope repairs and generate vendor quotes

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• Do pre-job walks the morning of a job and act as on-site GC for contractors and shops

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• Source and install spare parts; coordinate with local vendors and machine shops on repairs

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• Get hands-on with mechanical work directly when needed — including pipe/tube bending as a stopgap (we're actively working to reduce how often this falls to this role)

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• Troubleshoot existing facility equipment and support day-to-day reliability

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• Help build out our reliability program and CMMS as we grow (PM planning, spare parts, failure tracking) — this is a program, so there's real room to shape it

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Engineering and documentation

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• Produce mechanical drawings as needed: isometrics, vessel nozzle projections, and similar field-to-drawing translations

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• Draft and modify process and maintenance SOPs

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• Support small capital retrofits from concept through installation and commissioning, and work with engineering leadership and outside partners on larger projects

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• Assess and iterate equipment design to reach steady-state, on-spec operation

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Process and facility support

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• Support process monitoring efforts to catch trends affecting output, quality, or equipment integrity

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• Work closely with Operations, Plant Management, and QA/QC to flag and resolve equipment and infrastructure issues

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• Develop and help implement facility improvement plans

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• Document and communicate work plans and results on a regular basis

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• Support other projects and team members as needed

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Qualifications / Skills

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We're open to a few different backgrounds here — what matters most is a proven ability to move fluidly between hands-on fieldwork and engineering-level documentation:

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• B.S. in mechanical engineering (or related field) with 3+ years in a manufacturing environment; or a strong millwright/mechanic/technician background with demonstrated ability to read and produce mechanical drawings and work at an engineering level (formal degree not required if the experience is there)

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• Comfortable being the one who shows up to a job site, scopes it, and sees it through — not just specifying work for someone else to do

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• Working ability to produce mechanical drawings (isometrics, nozzle projections, etc.)

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• Deep respect for safe operation of manufacturing equipment; experience with formal or informal process hazard analysis, and a habit of surfacing safety concerns proactively

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• Experience working with outside vendors, OEMs, mechanical shops, and fabricators — especially on piping and pressure vessel retrofits

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• Familiarity with relevant codes and mechanical integrity practices (ASME VIII, NFPA, API 510/570/653, RBI, fitness-for-service, etc.)

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• Experience with reliability programs and CMMS (PM planning/scheduling, spare parts management, failure tracking) is a strong plus

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• Comfortable with ambiguity — able to take a project from a blank canvas to fully operational, with support but without hand-holding

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• Willingness to do lower-level mechanical work (like tube bending) when the job requires it, even as we work to phase that out of this role

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• Attention to detail and strong written/verbal communication for documentation and cross-team coordination

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If you're working toward some of the above rather than fully there already, we still encourage you to apply. A real person reviews every application.

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What we Offer

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We offer competitive compensation ($130k-150k, commensurate with experience), equity at a meaningful stage in Savor’s growth, and a full suite of benefits. This is a hands-on, on-site position — you'll need to be able to commute to our facility in Batavia, IL.

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We are an Equal Opportunity Employer — we do not discriminate in hiring, promotions, or any other way on the basis of , , , (including and ), , political affiliation, , marital status, , genetic information, , membership in an employee organization, retaliation, parental status, military service, or other non-merit factor.

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To apply: Please send your resume/CV to amee@savor.it

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