NXTGEN Intern Challenge 2026 Intake

About NXTGEN Industries

NXTGEN Industries is an Australian robotics and automation company deploying autonomous inspection systems into infrastructure, rail, construction, and mining environments. We build the full stack — from hardware integration and mission execution through to data pipelines and operator-facing platforms. Our systems operate on real assets, in real conditions, on real schedules.

The Program

The NXTGEN Intern Challenge is a single engineering problem, worked by a team of interns, in an environment of its own.

We set the problem. It is a real engineering challenge, chosen because it exercises the full stack of what we build, but it sits deliberately outside our client work. Because it is not tied to a client deliverable, there is room to make decisions, get them wrong, and do them again properly, which is not something a live project can ever offer you.

You work on it as a team, not as individuals handed separate tasks. Our engineers mentor the group and review the work as it goes, the same way we review each other’s.

What You’ll Work Across

The program is built so that everyone touches everything, rather than being streamed into one discipline on day one. Over 3 to 6 months you will get real exposure to:

• Mechanical and mechatronic design: structures, mounts, actuation and the physical build
• Electrical design: power, wiring, cabinet layout, and the practical side of making a system safe and serviceable
• PCB design: schematic capture through to board layout
• Control systems: motor controllers, actuation, and closed-loop behaviour
• Sensors and perception: hands-on with the LIDAR and sensor hardware we run in house
• Software: back end services, front end interfaces, and the code that ties the hardware together
• Assembly and testing: building it, then finding out what you got wrong when you run it

You will not go equally deep in all of it, and we do not expect you to. Most people arrive strong in one area and leave competent across several, with a much clearer idea of which one they want to commit to.

How You’ll Work

The Challenge runs the way a real engineering project runs, because that is half of what you are here to learn. You work in an agile format, in sprints, with stand-ups and reviews. You work to timelines, and you are accountable to the rest of the team for your part of it.

You will use the tools and software that industry actually uses, not teaching versions of them. By the end you will know what it feels like to work in an industrial and commercial engineering environment, which is the part that is genuinely hard to get from a degree.

We Work With Your University

Before you start, we confirm what your faculty needs from us so that your placement counts toward your degree requirement rather than just sitting on your CV. We deal with that directly with the university, instead of leaving you to sort it out at the end.

What You Will Do

• Work as part of an intern team on one shared problem with a defined outcome
• Take real ownership of a part of the system, and be accountable to the rest of the team for it
• Sit in reviews with our engineers, who mentor the program alongside their normal work
• Build, wire, program and test the thing, not just design it on paper
• Present the outcome to the team at the close of the program

What We Are Looking For

This program is for students currently enrolled at university who need to complete industry work experience as part of their degree. It is not open to graduates.

• Currently enrolled in mechanical, mechatronic, electrical, robotics, computer science or a related engineering discipline, with a work experience requirement to complete
• Evidence that you build things: personal projects, competition teams, research, or anything you have actually made work
• Open to learning things outside your specialty. You might arrive as a software person and spend a fortnight on wiring and mechanical assembly, and the people who get the most out of the program are the ones who are up for that
• Comfortable working in a team on a shared problem rather than owning something alone
• Available for a continuous block of 3 to 6 months
• Australian work rights, or a student visa that permits the hours

Where You’ll Work

The program is based at our Melbourne head office, and you work across a mix of on-site and remote. The hands-on work happens in the office, with the hardware and alongside the engineers, and that is where most of the value is. Design, software, documentation and review can be done remotely, and we are flexible about how you split it around your class timetable.

You do need to be able to get to the Melbourne office regularly, so this one is not open nationally the way our permanent roles are.