Ethan Donlon

Designed test bed platform for Gen2 robot system with 3 control panels and custom PCBs under compressed timeline
Built novel 2D Lidar based safety system for acheiving functional safety via human presence detection

Mar 2025 - Sep 2025 · 7 mos

Led conveyor protection solution from root cause analysis, design, and testing, preventing damage through hardware controller improvements
Customized Kuka robot firmware for being able to run kuka robot arm without teach pendant attached
Led cross-functional debugging efforts for motor controllers, sensors, and communication systems

Feb 2024 - Mar 2025 · 1 yr 2 mos

Designed Gen1 electrical system with custom PCBs, reducing build cost from $5600 to $500-1000 (10x improvement)
Implemented single 480V power input system, saving customers $20k in electrical installation costs
Developed custom microcontroller for gripper with bare metal IO-Link protocol implementation, saving $20k in licensing costs
Developed networking infrastructure and configured industrial Ethernet protocols for robot communication systems
Owned robots PLC program, including creating a Linux command line tool for remote PLC deployment by reverse engineering 3rd party protocol, eliminating need for onsite Windows-based updates
Created comprehensive troubleshooting documentation and debugging tools for deployment engineers

Nov 2022 - Feb 2024 · 1 yr 4 mos

Sole designer of Gen0 electrical system, achieving full production deployment within 6 months of hire
Designed safety-compliant electrical cabinets with zero field failures across all deployed Gen0 robots
Established contract manufacturing partnership and created detailed production documentation

Jan 2021 - Aug 2022 · 1 yr 8 mos

Developing only wearable opioid harm prevention device, capable of both sensing and reversing an overdose by auto injecting lifesaving naloxone
Designed the electromechanical system, including PCB design and verification, CAD, and embedded software, to sense blood oxygen levels non-invasively from the shoulder
Prepare novel medical device for FDA clearance pathways and clinical studies to bring device to market
Team awarded Coulter Grant for promising innovation in health care to meet underserved clinical needs

Jun 2021 - Aug 2021 · 3 mos

Completed design changes using free body force analyses and tolerance analyses on integral parts of biomedical device to ensure safety and aid assembly, resulting in projected $100,000 annual savings
Created test fixtures and aided test engineers in determining design limits to validate new parts
Produced complex three-dimensional statistical tolerance analyses via CETOL

Jun 2020 - Aug 2020 · 3 mos

Collaborated with team to conceive design changes, assemble, streamline production, and develop operating procedures for biomedical devices.
Designed and implemented assembly fixtures using Solidworks to manufacture biomedical devices on large scale and communicated with mechanics to assure manufacturable designs.
Conducted force analysis on four body linkages to determine maximum allowable stress on safety mechanism.

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