About Ethan

萧欣 · Xiāo-xīn

Before founding Cost Down Engineering, I spent five years as a mechanical design engineer at Tesla, where I brought hundreds of parts from concept to production across every consumer vehicle platform.

Growing up in Canada with a Chinese mother and Canadian father drew me to Asia. Relocating to Singapore allows me to learn directly from the local manufacturing culture while bringing a Silicon Valley design methodology to the region.

My engineering journey spans solar-powered infrastructure for the Toronto Transit Commission, robotics research at the Technical University of Munich, and a Mechanical Engineering degree from the University of Waterloo, where I graduated top of my class and brought my capstone project to Canada's largest tech incubator.

I'm a native English speaker actively improving my Mandarin to communicate directly with factory teams across Taiwan, China, and Southeast Asia. When I'm not doing CAD reviews, you can find me at Singapore's hawker centers or brewing Gongfu tea.

Ethan Rosentreter, founder of Cost Down Engineering
University of Waterloo
University of Waterloo

B.ASc. Mech Eng.
Top of class

TU Munich
TU Munich

Robotics research

Tesla

5 years, Senior Mech. Design Engineer

CAD Tools

CATIA V5, SolidWorks, Onshape, Fusion 360

Languages

English (native)
Mandarin (HSK 4)

Location

Singapore · Operating globally

Senior Collaborators

Cost Down Engineering operates as a lead engineer plus a trusted network of senior collaborators, brought in based on project scope and category.

Aidan Hilborn, Senior Collaborator at Cost Down Engineering

Aidan Hilborn

Senior Product Design Engineer

Aidan brings 7+ years of hardware design across medical, consumer, and high-tech industries. He started his career as a mechanical engineer at Tesla and an industrial designer at Shopify, then joined Vancouver-based consultancy Iaconic Design, where he has led 10+ products from concept to scaled production for clients including Neuralink and Microsoft.

A Mechanical Engineering graduate of the University of Waterloo and Sanford Fleming co-op proficiency award recipient, Aidan complements Cost Down Engineering's mass-manufacturing focus with deep specialty in injection-molded enclosures, mechanism design, and full-product DFM.