Applications Engineer: Optics & Photonics

About us

PlanOpSim is a start-up company focusing on optics and photonics. Our mission is to make nano-photonics design easy and accessible. PlanOpSim develops a numerical simulation software to model and design metaoptics, and provides design services and training for metaoptics.

Metaoptics (for example nano-structured lenses) are an upcoming field in the nano-photonics industry. The technology has been named as one of the top 10 emerging technologies by the World Economic Forum. PlanOpSim’s software is at the heart of this technological breakthrough. It is used for the design of nano-structured photonic components in numerous domains like telecom, VR/AR devices, holography, medical, automotive and metrology. Our users are companies and research centres from Sydney to Silicon Valley.  

PlanOpSim is a start-up located in Ghent, Belgium, in the heart of a thriving region for photonics technology.

Job description

As applications engineer your goal is to apply PlanOpSim’s software to industrial photonics design and show our users how to do so.

Typical tasks include:

• Technical pre-sales support: Lead technical discovery, conduct product demonstrations, and help customers define and achieve technical success criteria.
• Customer engagement: Understand customer needs, analyse how PlanOpSim products can solve their problems, and articulate the value proposition to customers.
• Technical solutions: Create and deploy simulation solutions within customer workflows and provide technical support and troubleshooting.
• Product feedback and development: Collaborate with PlanOpSim R&D to translate customer requirements into new product features and help test new releases.
•  Training and services: Instruct training classes for customers and contribute to professional services projects.
• Marketing and sales support: Support sales and marketing activities by participating in webinars, online training, and customer meetings.

Ideal Candidate Profile

• A Master’s degree in Photonics, Physics, Electrical Engineering, Mathematics or equivalent through experience. A strong background in optics and photonics is essential.
• Proven experience with the modelling of optical systems, photonic components, and/or photonic integrated circuits.
• Awareness of techniques and challenges in software development for computational physics and or numerical optimization
• Fluent speaking and writing in English. Additional languages are considered a strong asset.
• A self-starting personality, who enjoys working in a rapidly changing environment.
• Hands-on experience with commercial optical software, especially PlanOpSim’s MetaCell and MetaComponent, in addition to Lumerical and other photonic simulation tools like RSoft or Zemax.
• Strong customer service aptitude with a focus on customer satisfaction.
• Technical expertise and the ability to solve complex engineering problems.
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively within multi-disciplinary teams.
• Good communication and presentation skills.
• Ability to travel up to 50% is sometimes required.

What we offer

You will receive a competitive salary and extra-legal benefits in line with your level of experience. An additional renumeration in company stock options is available if interested.

You will be joining a fast-growing start-up and have a strong impact on the company’s growth and future direction. Depending on your experience partial or complete remote work is possible.

By joining PlanOpSim you will be working at the cutting edge of technology with many opportunities for personal and professional growth. You will develop skills in the latest technologies in distributed computing, photonics and ML/AI. As a young technology company, we foster an open and flexible work environment.