Data Engineer

Tesla’s Manufacturing Quality team is looking for a Data Engineer to help vehicle engineers make data-driven quality decisions. In this onsite role in Austin, you’ll design data models, build scalable pipelines, and create tools that support faster defect analysis and more grounded root-cause investigations. The position also includes building full-stack applications and AI agents that help automate quality workflows in a high-volume manufacturing environment.

What you’ll do

• Design, build, and maintain scalable data pipeline architecture, advancing automation and standardization of ETL/ELT processes
• Identify and implement process improvements, including automation of manual workflows, query optimization, and infrastructure redesign for reliability and scale
• Design and develop full-stack web applications for defect analysis and investigation, including backend services, REST APIs, access control, and frontend interfaces
• Develop AI agents and retrieval systems that automate quality workflows and generate preliminary root-cause investigations for engineering review
• Evaluate agent performance for accuracy, groundedness, and appropriate handoff to engineering review
• Create visualizations, dashboards, and reports using Tableau, React, or Grafana to monitor key metrics and support decision-making
• Perform end-to-end analyses, from requirements gathering through data processing, modeling, statistical analysis, and root-cause investigation of system and metric changes

What you’ll bring

• Degree in Computer Science, Data Engineering, Data Science, Statistics, or an engineering discipline, or equivalent experience
• 2+ years of experience in data engineering, software engineering, or a related field
• Proficiency in Python and SQL
• Experience building and operating production ETL pipelines with Apache Airflow or an equivalent orchestration tool
• Experience with full-stack application development, including backend services and frontend interfaces, preferably with React
• Hands-on experience developing AI agents and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) systems, including tool calling, orchestration, embeddings, vector stores, and evaluation of output quality
• Experience building analytical dashboards using Streamlit, Grafana, Tableau, Power BI, or similar tools
• Experience with Git, code review, and CI/CD
• Experience with multiple data architecture paradigms (SQL, NoSQL, Kafka, Spark) and data communication protocols (REST, WebSocket)
• Experience deploying and operating production services on Kubernetes

Technologies

• Python, SQL
• Apache Airflow, ETL/ELT
• React
• Tableau, Grafana, Streamlit, Power BI
• Git, CI/CD
• NoSQL, Kafka, Spark
• REST APIs, WebSocket
• Kubernetes
• RAG, retrieval-augmented generation, embeddings, vector stores, tool calling

Role details

• Location: Austin, TX (onsite)
• Minimum experience: 2 years

Benefits

• Medical plans with more than plan options with $0 payroll deduction
• Family-building, fertility, adoption and surrogacy benefits
• Dental (including orthodontic coverage) and vision plans with options and $0 paycheck contribution
• Company paid (HSA) contribution when enrolled in the High-Deductible medical plan with HSA
• Healthcare and Dependent Care Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA)
• 401(k) with employer match, Employee Stock Purchase Plans, and other financial benefits
• Company paid Basic Life and AD&D
• Short-term and long-term disability insurance (90 day waiting period)
• Employee Assistance Program
• Sick and Vacation time (Flex time for salary positions, Accrued hours for Hourly positions), and Paid Holidays
• Back-up childcare and parenting support resources
• Voluntary benefits including critical illness, hospital indemnity, accident insurance, theft & legal services, and pet insurance
• Weight Loss and Tobacco Cessation Programs
• Teslа Babies program
• Commuter benefits
• Employee discounts and perks program