Application Engineer, Additive Manufacturing
Confirmed on the employer's own hiring board on Sep 28, 2026. First seen by Alion on Sep 25, 2026.
About Aether
Aether Bio is a deep tech company that uses machine learning to discover proteins with high-impact, real-world industrial applications. We’re building super materials, processing critical minerals, and developing new deployable manufacturing technologies. Our current product lines target the defense, unmanned aerospace, and industrial manufacturing sectors, strengthening American manufacturing competitiveness.
We are a team of ~40 people spearheading next-generation polymer composite material for additive manufacturing and beyond. Our products are gaining traction in highly demanding 3D printing applications like robotics, drones, and defense - where designers and engineers require differentiated speed and performance.
Role Overview
As Applications Engineer, you will serve as the technical bridge between Aether and our end users. This customer-facing role will work directly with engineers at organizations to evaluate, optimize, and expand the use of our materials in real-world applications.
You will partner with prospects, existing customers, resellers, and hardware OEM partners to support successful adoption of our materials, troubleshoot printing challenges, and redesign parts to take advantage of our unique material properties. You will also play a critical role internally by identifying patterns in customer usage, documenting best practices, creating technical content, and helping shape future product development.
This role is highly cross-functional and combines elements of applications engineering, product marketing, technical consulting, and early-stage product feedback.
Travel of up to 40% is expected, particularly during the first year as we build strong technical relationships with customers.
What You’ll Do
Customer Deployment & Technical Engagement
Work directly with engineering teams to deploy and optimize our materials in their additive manufacturing workflows
Support both pre-sales evaluations and post-sale optimization and qualification
Travel onsite to assist with printer setup, parameter tuning, and troubleshooting
Guide customers with DfAM to maximize performance with our materials
Build Technical Credibility in the Market
Serve as a trusted technical partner to our customers and users
Communicate clearly about the strengths and limitations of our materials
Collaborate to identify new applications where our materials deliver the greatest performance advantages
Represent Aether technical capabilities at events, trade shows, and conferences
Capture Learnings & Develop Content
Identify usage patterns across customer environments and printing systems
Develop internal and customer-facing technical guidance including:
Print parameters and best practices guidelines
Winning application highlights and case studies
Competitive landscape evaluations
Demo parts and applications highlighting unique Aether differentiators
Inform Product Development
Represent the Voice of the Customer, and provide structured feedback to our materials and product teams
Surface recurring technical challenges, feature requests, and opportunities for improvement
Help shape the roadmap for future materials and product iterations
What Success Looks Like (First 12 Months)
Customers achieve reliable, repeatable results using our materials
Increased reorder rates from existing customers
Successful technical deployments across multiple customers
Development of foundational technical documentation and print guidelines
Identification of high-value use cases where our materials provide clear advantages
Establishment of several technically credible reference customers
Required Experience
3+ years of experience in additive manufacturing, advanced materials, or industrial 3D printing applications
Hands-on experience tuning and optimizing FDM/FFF printing processes
Strong understanding of polymer behavior, print parameter tradeoffs, and additive manufacturing design principles (DfAM).
Experience working directly with engineering teams in technical environments
3D design/CAD skill set
Preferred Experience
Experience in highly regulated engineering environments
Background in manufacturing, materials science, polymer engineering, mechanical engineering, or related fields
Experience supporting customers in a field applications, technical consulting, or deployment role
Familiarity with design for additive manufacturing (DfAM)
Travel
Up to 40% travel, primarily within the United States.
Location
Hybrid remote and on-site at the Aether South San Francisco office