I am a Development engineer at DEKA Research, Dean Kamen's Company. Mostly we design and engineer cutting-edge medical devices such as the 'Luke' arm or the iBot but have been known to deviate into other areas.
At DEKA, I put similar skills to the ones being taught in FIRST teams to use every day. Rigorous problem solving skills rooted in math and science allow me to ensure that whatever project I'm working on is reliable and safe. Creative thinking similar to FIRST robot design allows me and the team I work with to innovate so we "are on the cutting-edge of whatever industry we choose to join".
http://www.dekaresearch.com/index.shtml
Before Joining DEKA I worked with ARTAIC INNOVATIVE MOSAIC, a startup company in Boston. They assemble custom tile mosaics from photos their customers send in. To keep costs and response time low they use robots to arrange the tiles instead of out-sourced labor. It was my job to design and build the robotic system from the ground up. My experience with FIRST along with my degrees in Mechanical Engineering and Robotics Engineering really helped with this project. Due to my involvement in this project, Artaic has lowered the time it takes to assemble a square foot of
custom mosaic mural from 2 hours to about 40 seconds!
http://www.artaic.com/
-Dan Karol