Software Engineer, X-ray Source Development

About Us:

How many companies can say they’ve been in business for over 179 years?!

Here at ZEISS, we certainly can! As the pioneers of science, ZEISS handles the everchanging environments in a fast-paced world, meeting it with cutting edge of technologies and continuous advancements. ZEISS believes that innovation and technology are the key to a sustainable future and solutions for global change. We have a diverse range of portfolios throughout the ZEISS family in segments like, Industrial Quality & Research, Medical Technology, Consumer Markets and Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology. We are a global company with over 42,000 employees and have over 4,000 in the US and Canada alone! Make a difference, come join the team!

Location: Dublin, CA

What’s the role?

The Software Engineer supports the development, automation, testing, and continuous improvement of manufacturing and engineering processes for advanced X-ray source products. This position combines software development, manufacturing automation, data analysis, and hands-on engineering support to improve production efficiency, product reliability, test capability, and data-driven decision-making.

The Software Engineer develops tools that automate production and test activities, acquires and processes engineering data, and provides analytical capabilities to characterize product performance and reliability. Working closely with manufacturing, test, reliability, and engineering teams, the role may also support production equipment and X-ray source testing as needed.

Sound Interesting?

Here’s what you’ll do:

Software Development & Manufacturing Automation

• Design, develop, test, and maintain software tools that automate manufacturing, engineering, and production-test processes.

• Develop automated data-acquisition solutions for collecting engineering and production information from test equipment.

• Develop scripts and utilities for processing large quantities of production and test data.

• Improve existing automation by increasing execution efficiency, reducing manual operations, and enabling parallel data-processing activities where appropriate.

• Develop methods for organizing and correlating production data, test results, product history, operating hours, and component serial-number information.

• Support the development and implementation of production and final-test automation, including automated acquisition of vacuum, emitter, and heater metrics.

Production Test & Engineering Support

• Support engineering and manufacturing teams with the execution and troubleshooting of production-test processes.

• Operate and support automated and semi-automated test equipment used for X-ray source conditioning, calibration, characterization, and final verification.

• Assist with high-voltage conditioning, emitter testing, focus and spot calibration, astigmatism correction, randomizer testing, droop verification, write-to-flash operations, and other production-verification activities.

• Monitor test progress, identify abnormal conditions, and troubleshoot issues encountered during source testing.

• Document source status, test conditions, anomalies, and completed manufacturing and test operations.

• Work directly with engineers and manufacturing personnel to support products through the production-test sequence, including Doghouse and Versa testing.

Engineering Data Analysis

• Develop software for analyzing production, calibration, reliability, and product-performance data.

• Aggregate and analyze data from multiple products, test stations, and historical production records.

• Develop filtering and data-cleaning methods that distinguish valid production results from failed or non-representative test data.

• Perform statistical analysis of product characteristics and manufacturing trends, including spot-size performance across products and operating energies.

• Generate engineering datasets, plots, summaries, and other analytical outputs used to support technical decisions.

• Support engineers in evaluating product performance across operating conditions and product populations.

Reliability & Root-Cause Investigation Support

• Develop data-collection and analytical tools that support product-reliability investigations.

• Correlate component serial numbers with manufacturing history, operating hours, production results, field information, and test data.

• Support engineering investigations through automated acquisition and analysis of source and component performance data.

• Prepare structured datasets for additional statistical analysis using engineering analysis tools such as JMP.

• Assist engineers in identifying patterns and relationships among manufacturing history, component configuration, and observed product behavior.

Production & Process Improvement

• Identify opportunities for software and automation to reduce repetitive manual activities and improve manufacturing efficiency.

• Support the development and improvement of automated production workflows.

• Assist with integrating software tools into manufacturing and engineering environments.

• Maintain clear documentation for software tools, data-analysis methods, test activities, and production status.

• Collaborate with engineering and manufacturing teams to improve the traceability and accessibility of production data.

Do you qualify?

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline.

• Programming experience in one or more general-purpose programming languages.

• Experience developing scripts, software tools, or automation applications.

• Understanding of software-development fundamentals, including debugging, testing, data structures, and structured problem solving.

• Ability to work with structured engineering or manufacturing datasets and troubleshoot problems involving both software and hardware.

• Strong analytical and technical problem-solving skills.

• Ability to clearly document technical work and communicate results to engineering and manufacturing teams.

• Comfort working in a hands-on engineering, laboratory, or manufacturing environment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with manufacturing automation, automated test systems, or engineering software development.

• Experience developing automated data-acquisition or test-analysis tools and processing large engineering datasets.

• Experience with statistical or engineering analysis tools such as JMP or similar platforms.

• Familiarity with laboratory instrumentation, automated test equipment, or hardware/software interfaces.

• Experience supporting high-technology manufacturing or complex electromechanical products.

• Familiarity with production traceability, reliability analysis, calibration, characterization, or final-test processes.

• Experience collaborating with manufacturing, mechanical, electrical, test, quality, or reliability engineers.

The annual pay range for this position is $108,000 - $135,000

The pay offered for this role may be influenced by factors such as job location, scope of role, qualifications, education, experience, & complexity/specialization/scarcity of talent.

This position is also eligible for a performance bonus or sales commissions. ZEISS also offers robust benefits, including medical plans, retirement savings plan and paid time off.

We have amazing benefits to support you as an employee at ZEISS!

• Medical
• Vision
• Dental
• 401k Matching
• Employee Assistance Programs
• Vacation and sick pay
• The list goes on!

The above is intended to describe the general content of and requirements for this job. It is not to be construed as an exhaustive statement of requirements, duties, or responsibilities. The Company reserves the right to interpret, amend, or otherwise modify, in whole or in part, any job description at any time, at its sole discretion.

Your ZEISS Recruiting Team:

Zeiss provides Equal Employment Opportunity without unlawful regard to an Applicants race, color, religion, creed, sex, gender, marital status, age, national origin or ancestry, physical or mental disability, medical condition, military or veteran status, citizen status, sexual orientation, pregnancy (includes childbirth, breastfeeding or related medical condition), genetic predisposition, carrier status, gender expression or identity, including transgender identity, or any other class or characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law of the employee (or the people with whom the employee associates, including relatives and friends).