Senior Process Engineer

Empower Your Future: At MetOx International, we're pioneering the next era of energy security and abundance through breakthrough superconducting technology. As a Senior Process Engineer, you'll join a dynamic team committed to strengthening the world's energy systems to make them more resilient, efficient, and reliable.

Based at our global headquarters in Houston, TX, the Senior Process Engineer will lead process optimization projects, drive defect reduction, and support scaling and documentation of critical process steps.

Key Responsibilities

Engineering Leadership

• Leads development, optimization, and continuous improvement of HTS buffer layer deposition processes using PVD systems.
• Serves as the technical owner of the buffer deposition tool and process, ensuring high reliability, stability, and process capability.
• Designs and executes experiments to understand and control thin-film growth mechanisms, including grain size, orientation, and texture.
• Investigates complex process and equipment issues, determines root causes, and implements long-term corrective actions.
• Develops deep understanding of how process parameters and equipment behavior influence thin-film nucleation, microstructure, and film performance.

Project Execution

• Owns process development and improvement projects from problem definition through experimental validation and implementation.
• Defines timelines, deliverables, and success metrics for engineering initiatives.
• Tunes and optimizes key PVD process parameters including plasma characteristics, ion-assisted deposition conditions, reactive process behavior, cathode voltage hysteresis, RF and pulse parameters, gas environment, and energy delivered to the growing film.
• Translates experimental results into robust and repeatable manufacturing process windows.
• Develops models linking process conditions, equipment performance, and resulting film microstructure.
• Partners with engineering, production, and maintenance teams to implement process improvements and ensure stable manufacturing operations.

Documentation & Quality

• Maintains process documentation, specifications, and operating procedures to meet quality and regulatory standards.
• Reviews and updates control plans and process failure mode and effects analyses (PFMEAs).
• Uses statistical analysis and data-driven methods to evaluate engineering trials and production performance.
• Supports process scaling, transfer, and documentation as manufacturing volume increases.

Mentorship

• Mentors junior engineers and supports development of internal technical expertise in thin-film deposition and PVD processing.
• Promotes first-principles thinking, engineering rigor, and data-driven decision making across the team.
• Other duties as assigned

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in engineering or related field.
• 4 years of process or manufacturing experience. An advanced degree may be substituted for required experience on a year-for-year basis, depending on relevance and level.
• Hands-on experience tuning thin-film grain size, texture, or crystallographic orientation using PVD techniques, including ion-assisted deposition.
• Experience sustaining and optimizing vacuum deposition systems.
• Strong first-principles understanding of how PVD process parameters influence film growth, including plasma characteristic, ion energy and flux, cathode voltage and pulsed power, gas pressure and mean free path, film nucleation and grain evolution.
• Prior exposure to thin-film metrology in characterizing thin film texture such as x-ray diffraction, electron diffraction (preferably RHEED), and ellipsometry.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Advanced degree in engineering or related field.
• Experience leading Kaizen or lean events.
• Familiarity with Six Sigma, statistical analysis, or automation tools.
• Experience with ion-assisted deposition or epitaxial thin-film growth especially in HTS applications.
• Experience owning or sustaining complex vacuum deposition tools.
• Background in superconducting materials, oxide films, or textured thin-film systems.

Knowledge, Skills, & Abilities:

• Deep curiosity about how equipment physics and process physics interact.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving ability with a data-driven engineering mindset.
• Ability to translate complex experimental results into clear process insights and manufacturable solutions.
• Comfort leading technical investigations with minimal supervision.
• Excellent communication skills and a quality-first engineering approach

Physical Demands: This position requires sitting at a desk and viewing a computer screen for extended periods while working or performing other office tasks. Ability to move around the office, including occasional standing, walking, and bending to retrieve documents, attend meetings, or use office equipment. Some light lifting may be required, up to 20 lbs.

MetOx is proud to offer competitive benefits including:

• Health, dental, and vision available on the first day of employment
• 401(k) match
• Paid parental leave & adoption assistance
• Educational reimbursement
• And more!

We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.