- Location
- Portland, Oregon, United States
- Workplace
- Onsite
- Type
- Full-time
- Department
- NFI USA
- Seniority
- Senior
- Source
- Recruitee
Description
About Nearfield Instruments
Nearfield Instruments is a scale-up bringing together some of the world’s most creative minds in science and technology. We develop revolutionary high-throughput Atomic Force Microscopy systems that provide atom-scale 3D metrology at production-level throughput.
Our technology helps leading semiconductor manufacturers solve complex process-control challenges. We design, develop, integrate, and support advanced metrology systems for next-generation semiconductor manufacturing.
As we continue to expand in the United States, we are looking for an experienced Senior Software Systems Engineer who can connect customer needs and field experience with our software development organization.
What will you be doing?
As Senior Software Systems Engineer, you will act as the technical bridge between our customers, the U.S. field organization, and our Research & Technology Development software teams.
This is not primarily a software development or coding position. Your main responsibility is to understand how our software and equipment perform in a semiconductor manufacturing environment. You will gather and analyze customer requirements, investigate system issues, and translate operational needs into clear, actionable requirements for our RTD teams.
You will work directly with customers and internal engineering teams to improve system functionality, stability, usability, and productivity. This requires a strong system-level mindset and the ability to understand how software interacts with hardware, automation, motion control, and other parts of a complex semiconductor metrology system.
Your responsibilities
Act as the primary software systems expert supporting Nearfield equipment at customer sites.
Engage with customers and field teams to gather, analyze, and clarify operational and software requirements.
Translate customer needs and field observations into clear functional requirements, improvement requests, and problem statements for RTD software teams.
Serve as the voice of the customer when discussing software priorities and product improvements.
Troubleshoot software, system-integration, and platform issues across complex semiconductor metrology equipment.
Determine whether system issues originate from software, hardware interfaces, automation, configuration, networking, or other system interactions.
Work closely with RTD software teams to investigate defects, define required improvements, and validate corrective actions.
Install, configure, validate, and support software releases, upgrades, patches, service packs, and hot fixes.
Validate new software functionality in a customer environment before broader deployment.
Support root-cause investigations involving software, hardware, motion control, automation, and overall system performance.
Partner with Applications, Service Engineering, Systems Engineering, Program Management, and Product Development to improve product performance.
Develop troubleshooting guides, best-known methods, and field documentation.
Support software-related customer escalations requiring detailed technical analysis and cross-functional coordination.
Assist with customer demonstrations, product evaluations, and new product introductions.
Travel to customer locations in the United States and periodically to Nearfield’s headquarters in the Netherlands.