On is a sportswear company headquartered in Zurich, with additional offices in Portland and Yokohama. Founded in 2010, the company designs and manufactures running shoes and apparel. Its core technical work centers on sports footwear engineering, cushioning systems, and material science, with the CloudTec® cushioning system representing its primary mechanical innovation. CloudTec® is a patented outsole architecture that uses individual "cloud" elements to decouple vertical cushioning from forward propulsion - the elements compress on landing and lock on toe-off, attempting to separate impact absorption from energy return.
The CloudTec® system has shipped at scale across On's product line, reaching over 7 million athletes in more than 50 countries. For robotics engineers, the relevant engineering context here is the intersection of compliant mechanism design and closed-loop control under variable loading: the shoe's cushioning elements must behave predictably across a range of body weights, stride patterns, and surface conditions. On's material science work involves tuning polymer formulations and element geometry to achieve consistent deformation profiles - a set of constraints familiar to anyone working with soft actuators or variable-stiffness structures.
On's geographic and market footprint spans over 50 countries, and the company continues to invest in footwear R&D from its Swiss engineering base. Engineers interested in the mechanical design and materials problems inherent in high-volume compliant systems - where reliability, manufacturability, and performance must converge - will find a substantive set of challenges in On's product development work.
