Senior Systems Engineer

This is an incredible opportunity to be part of a company that has been at the forefront of AI and high-performance data storage innovation for over two decades. DataDirect Networks (DDN) is a global market leader renowned for powering many of the world's most demanding AI data centers, in industries ranging from life sciences and healthcare to financial services, autonomous cars, Government, academia, research and manufacturing.

"DDN's A3I solutions are transforming the landscape of AI infrastructure." - IDC

"The real differentiator is DDN. I never hesitate to recommend DDN. DDN is the de facto name for AI Storage in high performance environments" - Marc Hamilton, VP, Solutions Architecture & Engineering | NVIDIA

DDN is the global leader in AI and multi-cloud data management at scale. Our cutting-edge data intelligence platform is designed to accelerate AI workloads, enabling organizations to extract maximum value from their data. With a proven track record of performance, reliability, and scalability, DDN empowers businesses to tackle the most challenging AI and data-intensive workloads with confidence.

Our success is driven by our unwavering commitment to innovation, customer-centricity, and a team of passionate professionals who bring their expertise and dedication to every project. This is a chance to make a significant impact at a company that is shaping the future of AI and data management.

Our commitment to innovation, customer success, and market leadership makes this an exciting and rewarding role for a driven professional looking to make a lasting impact in the world of AI and data storage.

We are seeking a Senior Systems Engineer (SE) to join DDN's Federal Sales Team. The ideal candidate will have a strong background in pre-sales activities, a deep understanding of AI, high-performance storage, and the overall HCP/AI ecosystem. In this role, you will provide technical expertise to Sales Representatives and collaborate closely with federal customers to design innovative AI and HPC storage solutions. You will also be responsible for maintaining strong relationships, driving technical engagement, and supporting the entire sales cycle from initial discussions to post-sales implementation.

Key Responsibilities:

Pre-sales Technical Expertise: Provide technical pre-sales support for AI and high-performance storage solutions in the federal sector, leveraging DDN's cutting-edge storage technologies and AI-driven solutions.
• Solution Design: Work closely with customers to understand their technical needs and design tailored storage solutions that meet their specific business and AI-driven performance requirements.
• Business and Technical Understanding: Collaborate with Sales Teams to qualify opportunities and help close deals by aligning technical solutions with customer needs. Utilize your technical expertise to assist in defining solution specifications.
• RFPs and Proposals: Prepare RFP responses, technical presentations, system diagrams, and BOMs (Bills of Materials) for proposed solutions. Clearly communicate complex technical concepts to customers and internal teams.
• Proof of Concept (PoC) and Benchmarking Support: Lead the design and execution of PoC and benchmarking activities to demonstrate the value of DDN solutions to federal customers, ensuring the proposed solutions meet performance and scalability requirements.
• Customer Engagement: Build and maintain long-term relationships with federal customers, ensuring continued satisfaction, repeat business, and the alignment of DDN's solutions with evolving customer needs.
• Post-Sales Support: Assist customers with product installation, integration, and training, as required. Provide technical support during the implementation phase and ensure a seamless transition from sales to deployment.
• Mentoring: Mentor junior Systems Engineers, share knowledge, and support their professional growth within DDN's culture of innovation and technical excellence.
• Professional Services Solutions: Help expand DDN's professional services offerings by designing and implementing customized solutions that go beyond DDN products, addressing specific customer needs and enabling scalable AI and HPC deployments.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Work closely with DDN's Product, Marketing, and Engineering teams to stay informed on the latest AI and storage technologies and share feedback from the field to guide product development.

Qualifications:

• Technical Expertise: Strong understanding of AI-driven storage solutions, high-performance computing (HPC), and parallel file systems (Lustre, GPFS, or Exascale). Familiarity with AI infrastructure in both academic and government environments is highly desirable.
• Experience: Minimum of 5 years in pre-sales or technical sales engineering roles, with a focus on storage systems, AI, and HPC.
• Operating Systems & Scripting: Hands-on experience with Linux (Red Hat, SUSE, CENTOS, Ubuntu) and Windows environments. Proficiency in scripting languages such as Shell, Python, Perl, C++, or Java.
• Storage Technologies: Experience with storage architectures such as SAN, NAS, RAID, and parallel file systems. Expertise with block storage and distributed storage systems is required.
• Networking Knowledge: Familiarity with networking concepts, including Infiniband, Ethernet, and NAS protocols (CIFS, NFS, SMB, etc.).
• Security Clearance: Active Security Clearance (TS/SCI) or the ability to obtain one is required.
• Education: Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or a related field; relevant certifications or equivalent work experience in HPC and AI technologies is a plus.
• Soft Skills: Excellent communication and presentation skills. Ability to translate complex technical information into clear, concise proposals and presentations. Strong relationship-building skills and the ability to work cross-functionally with sales, engineering, and product teams.
• Travel: Ability to travel up to 20-30% for customer engagements, installations, and conferences.

DDN has a very strong orientation towards these 4 characteristics and any successful employee will demonstrate these capabilities:

Self-Starter - Takes independent action to identify and solve problems. Seeks out relevant information needed to make decisions. Gets involved with new initiatives.

Success/Achievement Orientation - Delivers quality results consistently. Targets, achieves (or exceeds) measurable results. Sets challenging goals, focuses on critical priorities, and is accountable.

Problem Solving - Recognizes problems and responds with a systematic assessment that identifies and addresses cause of issue. Practical, realistic, and resourceful.

Innovative - Builds and improves key business processes that enhance the effectiveness of DDN. Generates new ideas, challenges the status quo, and solves problems creatively.

DataDirect Networks, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity, gender expression, transgender, sex stereotyping, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, protected Veteran Status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.

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