Vice President, Product Engineering

Lumentum•San Jose, CA

About The Position

The Vice President of Product Engineering is the senior leader accountable for product engineering strategy, execution, and organizational performance across multiple wafer fabrication sites producing indium phosphide (InP)-based optoelectronic devices. Reporting to the EVP of Global Fabs, this role builds and leads a high-performing, data-driven organization that translates customer and business requirements into stable, scalable, high-yielding, reliable manufacturing solutions. The VP partners with wafer-fab operations, process engineering, device design, epitaxy, test, reliability, quality, supply chain, packaging, sales, and program management. The role establishes common methods and priorities across fabs and oversees products through development, qualification, production ramp, sustaining, cost reduction, and end-of-life management. The VP owns the global product engineering strategy, operating model, staffing plan, technical roadmap, and budget for multiple InP wafer fabs. The role leads product engineering teams responsible for new product introduction, production ramp, sustaining engineering, yield improvement, test strategy, product characterization, and cost reduction. It establishes product ownership, decision rights, escalation paths, and performance expectations while fostering technical rigor, accountability, rapid problem solving, cross-functional collaboration, and continuous improvement. The position leads manufacturing readiness and transfer of new products into qualified, repeatable, high-volume manufacturing. It sets release criteria, readiness reviews, qualification plans, control plans, test limits, data requirements, and ramp plans, and promotes design-for-manufacturability, design-for-test, and design-for-reliability. It coordinates product and process transfers between fabs, addressing equivalency, documentation, change control, risk management, and customer requirements. The VP owns product yield, electrical and optical performance, test yield, outgoing quality, reliability, and cost improvement roadmaps. The role drives structured problem solving and cross-functional improvement programs, correlates data across epitaxy, wafer fabrication, testing, packaging, and field performance, and ensures product specifications, guard bands, screening methods, and test limits are technically justified and aligned with customer and reliability requirements. The position standardizes engineering processes, metrics, data systems, documentation, and technical reviews across sites while accounting for site capabilities. It chairs product performance, yield, quality, reliability, and manufacturing readiness reviews; develops capacity and resource plans; partners with operations and process engineering to resolve constraints and improve cycle time and variability; and provides executive visibility into risks, recovery plans, customer impacts, investments, and business tradeoffs. The VP serves as senior technical interface for critical product and customer escalations, partners with Quality on applicable systems and qualification requirements, supports product portfolio decisions with fact-based assessments, and works with commercial and program teams to translate customer requirements into executable plans. The role also protects intellectual property and ensures disciplined handling of technical, customer, and manufacturing information. Regular travel among wafer-fab locations, suppliers, partners, and customer sites may be required as business needs dictate.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, materials science, physics, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, or a related technical field.
Typically 15 or more years of progressive experience in semiconductor, photonics, or optoelectronic product engineering, including substantial leadership experience in a manufacturing environment.
Demonstrated success leading product engineering across multiple products, technologies, manufacturing sites, or geographically distributed teams.
Deep understanding of semiconductor or optoelectronic device manufacturing, preferably including compound semiconductor materials, epitaxy, wafer fabrication, optical and electrical test, reliability, and packaging interfaces.
Proven record of improving yield, product performance, reliability, manufacturing stability, cycle time, and cost through data-driven engineering.
Strong knowledge of new product introduction, product qualification, production ramp, configuration and change control, statistical methods, and structured problem-solving tools.
Experience building organizations, developing leaders, managing technical talent, and prioritizing resources across a complex product portfolio.
Executive-level communication skills and ability to influence engineering, operations, quality, commercial, finance, and customer organizations.
Ability to travel regularly among wafer-fab locations, suppliers, partners, and customer sites as business needs require.

Nice To Haves

An advanced technical or business degree is strongly preferred.
Experience with InP-based lasers, photodetectors, modulators, photonic integrated circuits, or related optoelectronic components.
Experience supporting high-volume wafer fabrication and downstream assembly and test operations for telecom, datacom, sensing, aerospace, defense, or other high-reliability markets.
Familiarity with automated data systems, manufacturing execution systems, product lifecycle management, statistical analysis platforms, and advanced analytics.
Experience with fab-to-fab product transfer, external foundry or supplier management, and customer qualification programs.
Working knowledge of relevant semiconductor and quality standards, such as ISO 9001 and applicable automotive, telecom, aerospace, or customer-specific requirements.

Responsibilities

Own the global product engineering strategy, operating model, staffing plan, technical roadmap, and budget for multiple InP wafer fabs.
Lead, develop, and retain product engineering leaders and technical teams responsible for new product introduction, production ramp, sustaining engineering, yield improvement, test strategy, product characterization, and cost reduction.
Define product ownership, decision rights, escalation paths, and performance expectations across sites; foster technical rigor, accountability, problem solving, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
Lead transfer of new InP-based optoelectronic products from design and development into qualified, repeatable, high-volume manufacturing.
Establish product release criteria, manufacturing readiness reviews, qualification plans, control plans, test limits, data requirements, and production ramp plans.
Ensure design-for-manufacturability, design-for-test, and design-for-reliability practices are incorporated early in the product lifecycle.
Coordinate product and process transfers between fabs, including equivalency, documentation, change control, risk management, and customer requirements.
Own product yield, electrical and optical performance, test yield, outgoing quality, reliability, and cost improvement roadmaps.
Drive structured problem solving using statistical process control, design of experiments, fault isolation, root-cause analysis, failure analysis, and corrective and preventive action methods.
Lead improvement programs addressing wafer-level variation, device performance, defectivity, parametric yield, test coverage, reliability margins, and product cost.
Establish methods to correlate epitaxy, wafer fabrication, wafer-level test, die-level test, packaging, final test, and field performance data.
Ensure product specifications, guard bands, screening methods, and test limits are technically justified and aligned with customer and reliability requirements.
Standardize product engineering processes, metrics, data systems, documentation, and technical reviews across sites while accounting for site-specific capabilities.
Chair product performance, yield, quality, reliability, and manufacturing readiness reviews with fab and functional leaders.
Develop capacity and resource plans aligned with product demand, technology roadmaps, fab capabilities, and business priorities.
Partner with operations and process engineering to resolve constraints, improve cycle time, reduce variability, and sustain production continuity.
Provide executive-level visibility into product risks, recovery plans, customer impacts, investment needs, and business tradeoffs.
Serve as the senior technical interface for critical product performance, yield, quality, reliability, and customer escalation matters.
Partner with Quality to ensure compliance with applicable quality management systems, product qualification requirements, change-control processes, and customer-specific standards.
Support product portfolio decisions with fact-based assessments of technical readiness, manufacturing risk, yield, cost, capital requirements, and lifecycle economics.
Work with commercial and program teams to translate customer requirements into executable product and manufacturing plans.
Protect intellectual property and ensure disciplined handling of technical, customer, and manufacturing information.
Travel regularly among wafer-fab locations, suppliers, partners, and customer sites as business needs require.
Deliver predictable, on-time product qualification and production ramps; sustained improvements in yield, performance, reliability, quality, and cost; reduced variability, excursions, resolution time, and customer disruption; consistent engineering governance across fabs; and a strong leadership bench.