Senior Principal Applications Engineer / Technical Lead - Livermore, CA, United States
$136,200 - $178,815 USD yearly
Originally posted 14 September 2026 by the employer.
Support strategic semiconductor customers and advanced wafer probe solutions, including Silicon Photonics and Co-Packaged Optics.
About the role
As a Senior Principal Applications Engineer / Technical Lead, you will serve as a senior customer-facing technical leader supporting strategic semiconductor customers and advanced wafer probe solutions. This role is a key element of FormFactor's evolving Customer Solutions Team, focused on improving the end-to-end customer experience and accelerating adoption of FormFactor technologies.
What you'll do
- Serve as the primary technical advisor for strategic semiconductor customers.
- Lead customer engagements from evaluation through qualification, production release, and High Volume Manufacturing (HVM) ramp.
- Conduct on-site customer technical reviews, production readiness reviews, roadmap discussions, and executive briefings.
- Develop and deploy advanced application methodologies for semiconductor probe and test solutions.
- Support electrical, parametric, RF, optical, photonics, and high-speed device characterization.
- Serve as a recognized subject matter expert in semiconductor test, wafer probing, and device characterization.
What you'll need
- Experience in semiconductor test, semiconductor capital equipment, probe card technologies, wafer probe systems, or device characterization.
- Demonstrated success supporting strategic semiconductor customers in both development and production environments.
- Proven ability to lead complex technical engagements and customer escalations.
- Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Physics, Photonics, Materials Science, Mechanical Engineering, or related technical discipline.
Nice to have
- Automated Test Equipment (ATE)
- Wafer Probe Systems
- Probe Cards
- Semiconductor Test
- Device Characterization
- Parametric Test
- Wafer Sort
- Production Test
- RF and Microwave Measurements
- High-Speed Digital Testing
- Signal Integrity
- Silicon Photonics
- Optical Characterization
- Co-Packaged Optics (CPO)
- Advanced Packaging
- Heterogeneous Integration
- Yield Improvement
- Product Qualification
- New Product Introduction (NPI)
- Failure Analysis
- High Volume Manufacturing (HVM)
- JMP Scripting Language (JSL)
- MATLAB
- Python (Programming Language)
Skills: applications engineer, customer-facing, wafer probe solutions, semiconductor test, device characterization, ATE
This role has been open 30 days — well below the 69-day median for Applications FAE roles.
Applications FAE · Manufacturing Equipment
|
Open roles in category
191
|
Median days open
69 d
|
Median salary
$158k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, skills in demand, and who else is hiring
| Metric | FormFactor | All employers we track in this specialty (191 roles · 17 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 6 | 191 |
| Median days open | 55 d | 69 d (−14 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $158k |
Skills observed across this category: applications engineer, customer-facing, wafer probe solutions, semiconductor test, device characterization, ATE
Who's hiring in this category
- Teradyne · 56 open roles · median 27 d
- KLA Corporation · 43 open roles · median 115 d
- Applied Materials · 31 open roles · median 100 d
- Keysight Technologies · 16 open roles · median 61 d
- ASML · 7 open roles · median 114 d
- ASM International · 6 open roles · median 180 d
How we counted: 191 open Applications FAE (Manufacturing Equipment) roles from 17 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 15 Oct 2026. Specialty figures count only roles carrying this exact specialty label, so an employer's related work in neighbouring specialties is not included there. Figures refresh nightly.