Staff Product Cost Innovation Manager
Ōura · San Francisco Bay Area
📍 Hybrid - San Francisco, California💰 $198,500- $233,000via greenhousePosted 2026-09-22
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Our mission at Oura is to empower every person to own their inner potential. Our award-winning products help our global community gain a deeper knowledge of their readiness, activity, and sleep quality by using their Oura Ring and its connected app. We've helped millions of people understand and improve their health by providing daily insights and practical steps to inspire healthy lifestyles.
Empowering the world starts with living our values and empowering our team. As a quickly growing company focused on helping people live healthier and happier lives, we ensure that our team members have what they need to do their best work — both in and out of the office.
We are looking for a Staff Product Cost Engineer to establish and lead product cost engineering as a strategic capability within Product Sourcing. This role will own the cost and value perspective across the full product lifecycle, from early architecture and concept development through NPI, DVT/PVT, ramp, mass production, and sustaining.
You will build the fact base behind product cost decisions, translate product and manufacturing choices into transparent cost models, and partner with Engineering, Product, Finance, Quality, Supply Chain, and EMS partners to deliver products that meet Oura’s performance, quality, schedule, and cost objectives.
This is a hands-on, highly influential individual-contributor role. You will be expected to operate at the level of a technical and commercial authority: challenging assumptions with data, shaping design choices early, creating negotiation leverage, and turning cost opportunities into measurable results.
This role is hybrid to our SF office onsite 3 days a week
What You Will Do:
Own product cost targets and cost visibility:
Define target costs and cost architectures for new products, major subsystems, and key components in conjunction with Finance and Product teams
Reinforce and maintain cost models for complete products and assemblies, including electronic components, PCBA, mechanical parts, batteries, sensors, tooling, test, labor, yield, overhead, EMS value-add, logistics, tariffs, and other landed-cost elements.
Create a consistent cost taxonomy, modeling methodology, and set of assumptions that Engineering, Sourcing, Finance, and suppliers can use as a common fact base.
Track target, quoted, negotiated, and actual costs across the product lifecycle; identify variances, cost risks, and optimization opportunities.
Develop scenario models for volume, geography, sourcing strategy, supplier footprint, capacity, make-versus-buy, and design alternatives.
Drive design-to-cost and value engineering
Engage early in product architecture, concept, and design reviews to influence cost before designs are frozen.
Translate product requirements, BOMs, CAD, drawings, stack-ups, specifications, and manufacturing flows into cost and value implications.
Lead value-engineering workshops with mechanical, electrical, industrial design, reliability, quality, and manufacturing teams.
Identify opportunities involving component selection, architecture, tolerances, materials, finishes, part consolidation, test strategy, automation, cycle time, yield, packaging, and assembly flow.
Quantify cost, quality, schedule, reliability, and supply trade-offs so leaders can make informed decisions.
Partner with Engineering and NPI teams to ensure cost is considered at EVT, DVT, PVT, ramp, and sustaining milestones.
Connect cost engineering to supply chain execution
Driving cost bridge over multiple program generations.
Assess the cost impact of manufacturing readiness, line balance, automation, labor content, cycle time, tooling utilization, yield, scrap, rework, and capacity constraints.
Support factory build reviews and cost learning during prototype, validation, and production builds.
Work with EMS and logistics partners to separate material, conversion, NRE, capital, transportation, and margin elements in a transparent way.
Incorporate actual production performance into cost models and use the learning to improve future estimates and negotiations.
Build the capability and influence decisions
Create scalable templates, databases, dashboards, and governance for product cost engineering.
Establish cost-review mechanisms and clear ownership across Sourcing, Engineering, Finance, Operations, and Program Management.
Present product level cost analyses, recommendations, risks, and decisions to senior leadership with clarity and precision.
Mentor peers and raise the organization’s fluency in cost drivers, design-to-cost, supplier economics, and manufacturing trade-offs.
This is a hybrid role out of our San Francisco office.
Requirements
We Would Love to Consider You for this Role if You Have:
10–12+ years of experience in product cost engineering, should-cost analysis, value engineering, manufacturing engineering, strategic sourcing, supply-chain engineering, or a closely related discipline.
Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Supply Chain, or a related technical field; advanced degree is a plus.
Demonstrated experience costing complex, high-volume consumer electronics or wearable products across both electronic and mechanical domains.
Strong understanding of BOM structures, engineering drawings, tolerances, specifications, manufacturing processes, tooling, test, yield, labor, overhead, and supplier commercial models.
Experience developing bottom-up cost models and using them to set targets, evaluate design alternatives, challenge supplier quotes, and drive negotiations.
Practical knowledge of electronics and PCBA cost drivers, including component pricing, PCB fabrication, SMT placement, soldering, programming, inspection, ICT, functional test, and yield.
Practical knowledge of mechanical cost drivers, including plastics, metals, machining, stamping, die casting,
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