Director, Engineering & Product Development

Overview:

HoMedics is a privately-owned multinational company headquartered in Commerce Township, Michigan. Over the past 35 years, HoMedics has grown into a world leader in developing, marketing and distributing personal care, wellness and consumer electronics products. The Company’s products are sold under the HoMedics brand name, as well as other recognizable brands, including HMDX, Jam, Obusforme, Salter, Ellia, and House of Marley.

This success is attributable to innovation, speed to market, and depth/breadth of distribution. Growth has been both organic and through acquisitions. HoMedics extensive line of personal wellness products strives to promote overall well-being and create a healthy home environment that helps relax the body, renew the spirit, de-stress and simplify life. HoMedics has a full line of wellness products, including back, neck, foot and handheld massagers, sound spas, footbaths, essential oils and diffusers, humidifiers, air purifiers, blood pressure monitors, and more. The HoMedics brand is synonymous with innovation, especially in the massage category where the brand enjoys dominant market share.

HoMedics products are sold in more than 60 countries throughout North and South America, Central America, the Asia-Pacific region, Europe, Middle East and Africa, with North America representing 65% of the Company’s revenues. Products are sold in brick and mortar and online retail across all channels of distribution including mass, specialty, department store, club and drug, as well as independent distributors. As a private, family-owned organization, culture is a very important part of the experience at HoMedics. The operating style is fast-paced, innovative, and commercially driven. Adequate structure, nimbleness, and speed to market are key attributes of the Company’s culture and critical reason behind continued successes.

Job Description:

Operating within the core values of the company, the Director, Engineering & Product Development is responsible for the robust development and delivery of new innovated and enhanced products. This role is responsible for combining engineering/design with creativity and imagination to develop the next generation of best-selling durable consumer products in various categories.

Essential Functions & Duties:

• Manage product development projects to ensure they are all on time, on quality, on budget, on strategy and provide an exceptional consumer experience.
• Manage the product development process working collaboratively with Directors of Category Management and Product Managers while working closely with other departments/functions across the organization, including:
• Sales

• Project Management Office (PMO)

• Supply Chain Management

• Legal
• Brand Marketing
• Quality
• China NPD / support organization
• Customer Service
• Consumer Relations
• Logistics /Trade Compliance
• Finance

Foster the ideation and development of new consumer products. Specifically, help Product Teams identify the function, feature set and desired look of a product with a focus on creating innovative new features and products that stand out in marketplace and resonate with the consumer.

• Lead a team of engineers experienced inproduct requirements, performance testing, compliance testing, manufacturing design, and packaging design.
• Driver and champion of the use of AI and Automation tools in Engineering and QA/RA for the company.
• Identify and coordinate with Product Teams and Suppliers, new functionalities and product features while maintaining and/or reducing cost of manufacturing.
• Work closely with the quality and compliance functions to ensure all safety and regulatory requirements are continuously met.
• Work closely with the global sourcing organization with respect to vendor selection and qualification.
• Work directly with Legal (in-house and external) to maintain database of intellectual property such as patents and copyrights. Responsible to ensure protection of inventions and intellectual property, and thereby assists in filing for patents and copyrights, and maintain appropriate documents and files. Also provides technical and business support for various product-related litigation the company is involved in.
• Seek out and apply knowledge of new trends and innovation to identify not only new products but also opportunities to improve overall consumer experience (Out of Box experience)
• Develop and manage annual R&D budget
• High-level responsibility for Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs.
• High-level responsibility for Corporate ESG initiatives and obligations.