Theo Wride

UKSEDS Advanced Olympus Rover Trials · Bristol, UK

• Led the mechanical sub-group for a national university rover competition team, managing deadlines across all deliverables using Gantt charts, risk registers and budget plans.
• Ran static and dynamic FEA to confirm structural rigidity and tune the chassis's natural frequency clear of the competition's vibration-test parameters — achieving the best vibration-test performance in the competition.

Renishaw UK · Woodchester, UK

• Placement within Renishaw's interferometric laser encoder team.
• Redesigned product and assembly process elements, cutting manufacturing costs by £20k/year while resolving several high-cost quality concerns.
• Redesigned tooling for a key assembly, consolidating four manual steps into one automated operation — a 60% reduction in labour time (£10k/year saved) and the removal of an existing ergonomic strain.
• Led a cross-functional design team to develop new tooling for fibre optic assemblies, eliminating multiple assembly-related quality issues.
• Presented three workflow improvement strategies to the engineering team, including cost-benefit analysis on test equipment.

Nissan Motor Manufacturing UK (NMUK) · Sunderland, UK

• Collaborated with four design centres and contractors across Europe, the US and Japan to investigate and resolve high-priority customer quality concerns.
• Applied advanced CAD (surfacing, PLM management, design for manufacture) skills to optimise process cycle-times and operator ergonomics.
• Developed prototyping knowledge through jig design projects, including a 3D-printed TPU rubber jig, optimising for robust, accurate geometry.
• Built automotive tolerance stack-up skills to support root-cause analysis of dimensional fit-and-finish issues.
• Presented cost-reduction and quality items directly to senior plant directors.