Senior Field Engineer - US Federal

IonQ

About The Position

IonQ, Inc. [NYSE: IONQ] is the world’s leading quantum platform and merchant supplier, delivering integrated quantum solutions across computing, networking, sensing, and security. IonQ’s newest generation of quantum computers, the IonQ Tempo, has been helping customers and partners including Amazon Web Services and AstraZeneca achieve 20x performance results and accelerate innovation in drug discovery, materials science, financial modeling, logistics, cybersecurity, and defense. In 2025, the company achieved 99.99% two-qubit gate fidelity, setting a world record in quantum computing performance. Headquartered in College Park, Maryland, IonQ has operations in California, Colorado, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Washington, Italy, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Their quantum computing services are available through all major cloud providers, and they meet the needs of networking and sensing customers across land, sea, air, and space, making quantum platforms more accessible and impactful than ever before. IonQ is seeking a Senior Quantum Field Engineer for their US Federal business. In this role, you will be part of a team whose mission is to lead IonQ on its journey to build the world’s best quantum solutions and solve the world’s most complex problems. Field Engineering sits at the intersection of customers, markets, products and product teams, algorithms, applications, innovation and strategy, where ideas become applied and have impact. This role involves joining a nimble team of scientists, engineers, salespeople, marketers, business developers, and product managers to drive an entirely new quantum computing business. They are seeking versatile engineers and architects skilled in technical sales, technical demos, and customer interactions who are energized to deliver IonQ’s quantum computing products and quantum applications.

Requirements

10+ years of experience in technical customer-facing role or equivalent capacity.
The ability to communicate (at the various context-appropriate levels of depth) and persuade clearly, have strong EQ, and other customer-facing skills are critical.
US Citizen, with Top Secret (TS) / Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) clearance required.
5 years of focused experience with technology companies that support US Intel Agencies.
Bachelor’s degree or above in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Data Science, or other STEM field, such as Chemistry, Physics or Engineering.
Motivated learner with a strong interest in quantum computing.
Mission oriented person - driven to help the US Federal Government Intel agencies.

Nice To Haves

Masters or PhD in a STEM field, perhaps adjacent to quantum computing.
Time on the customer side in various verticals included leadership roles - this provides customer empathy.
Hands-on experience with Qiskit, Cirq or other quantum computing SDK.
Proficient in Python and Jupyter Notebooks.
Expert architecture skills across various technologies (“full stack skills”).
Experience leading technical events.

Responsibilities

Inspire and co-engineer solutions with the US Intel Agencies by explaining IonQ’s strategy, portfolio and answering technical questions about quantum portfolio (compute, network, security, sensing and space) and quantum applications.
Lead and shepherd client discussions, inspiring them to see how quantum applications can be implemented in their business domain.
Work through business needs and map Quantum Algorithms (financial services, bioscience, chemistry and materials, optimization, generative AI, and other domains) into application code and execute Proof-of-Concepts together with the IonQ Application team.
Share insights from clients with the IonQ Product Management and Engineering teams such that client feedback is incorporated into our products.
Navigate competitive objection handling.
Translate business needs expressed by our clients into technical work projects in collaboration with other team members.
Create assets to explain features of our quantum applications and other IonQ quantum products.
Move dialogs from initial ideation to focused exploration domain through to proof-of-concept and ultimately into production workflows.
Lead client discovery sessions for business-oriented use cases that uncover potential overlap with development of useful quantum algorithms together with the IonQ Application team.
Partner with marketing, developer relations and business development to grow awareness of IonQ in the world at large.
Attend industry conferences, as needed, to talk to client and support our booth activities.