VP Technical Customer Management

Advantest•San Jose, CA

18d

About The Position

The Vice President, Technical Customer Management (VP TCM) is accountable for enterprise-level technical execution and customer delivery across AIS’s strategic and priority customers. This role owns the end-to-end technical customer engagement model, ensuring predictable execution from early technical alignment through qualification, ramp, and sustained high-volume production. The VP TCM defines and leads the technical customer management strategy, integrating customer requirements, engineering execution, and operational readiness into a single, disciplined execution model. This leader establishes the standards, governance, and operating mechanisms required to ensure consistent outcomes across diverse customer environments while allowing for controlled flexibility where customer platforms and operating models differ. As a senior executive partner to Global Account Management (GAM), the VP TCM is the execution authority for technical customer commitments. The role acts as the primary integrator across engineering, manufacturing, supply chain, quality, and customer teams—bringing clarity, accountability, and transparency to high-visibility programs that directly impact customer confidence, revenue realization, and AIS’s external reputation.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Engineering (Mechanical, Electrical, Industrial, Materials, or related technical discipline); Master’s degree or MBA strongly preferred.
Minimum of 15 years of progressive experience in semiconductor, advanced manufacturing, hardware systems, or related high-tech industries.
Minimum of 8–10 years in senior leadership roles spanning technical program management, engineering leadership, customer-facing execution, or operations.
Demonstrated experience owning end-to-end customer technical engagement, including technology alignment, qualification, ramp, and sustaining execution.
Proven track record leading enterprise-scale, cross-functional programs involving engineering, manufacturing, supply chain, quality, and customers.
Direct experience interfacing with tier-1 strategic customers at the engineering, operations, and executive levels.
Demonstrated ability to translate customer requirements into executable technology and product roadmaps, aligned with qualification timing and operational constraints.
Strong understanding of product development lifecycles, NPI, qualification processes, and manufacturing ramp in complex customer environments.
Demonstrated capability to establish governance, metrics, and execution discipline across distributed teams and multiple sites.
Experience building, leading, and scaling senior technical or program management organizations.
Executive-level communication skills with the ability to clearly articulate risks, tradeoffs, and decisions to internal and external stakeholders.
Proven ability to operate effectively in high-ambiguity, high-urgency environments, balancing customer commitments with enterprise priorities.

Responsibilities

Define and lead AIS’s technical customer management strategy for strategic and high-impact customers.
Establish a scalable enterprise execution model governing how AIS engages, qualifies, ramps, and supports customers.
Own executive-level governance mechanisms, readiness criteria, and escalation frameworks for customer-facing programs.
Ensure alignment between customer commitments, AIS AOP objectives, technology roadmap, and operational capacity.
Serve as the executive technical and delivery counterpart to Global Account Managers.
Own execution alignment for roadmap commitments, qualification strategies, and delivery plans.
Support customer executive engagements, including formal reviews, escalations, and long-term capability discussions.
Drive consistency in customer engagement, execution discipline, and messaging across all strategic accounts.
Hold executive accountability for all customer-facing NPI and major sustaining programs.
Serve as the single point of ownership for technical execution outcomes across customer environments.
Own commitments are related to qualification performance, delivery schedules, execution predictability, and technical readiness.
Proactively manage cross-customer prioritization, tradeoffs, and resource alignment.
Define, institutionalize, and continuously improve critical technical and operational execution processes.
Ensure consistent application of best-practice program and qualification disciplines enterprise-wide.
Balance standardization with defined flexibility to accommodate customer-specific constraints.
Reinforce execution rigor through metrics, audits, governance reviews, and corrective action systems.
Act as the enterprise owner of customer technical requirements.
Ensure requirements are clearly documented, traceable, and translated into executable engineering and operational plans.
Manage requirement changes with disciplined impact assessment across cost, schedule, risk, and capacity.
Ensure customer feedback and early qualification learnings are incorporated into product and process improvements.
Partner with Engineering leadership to ensure customer commitments are delivered with robust, manufacturable, and scalable solutions.
Ensure the AIS technology roadmap development and refresh process is tightly aligned with the timing, qualification windows, and performance expectations of AIS’s strategic customers, enabling proactive planning and reducing execution risk.
Lead executive-level technical readiness and risk reviews focused on reliability, margin, and long-term sustainability.
Identify customer-critical technical and operational risks early and drive mitigation and escalation.
Own enterprise customer qualification strategy and execution framework.
Ensure manufacturing, supply chain, and quality readiness align with customer ramp requirements.
Support and lead customer audits, onsite engagements, and executive readiness assessments.
Ensure fast, disciplined issue resolution during qualification and early production ramp.
Build, lead, and scale a Technical Customer Management organization aligned to AIS growth objectives.
Develop senior leaders and program executives capable of operating at customer executive levels.
Establish clear role definitions, decision rights, and succession plans.
Create a culture of accountability, customer-centric execution, and continuous improvement.
Define KPIs tied to customer success and business outcomes, including qualification cycle time, execution predictability, issue escalation rates, and on-time delivery.
Provide clear executive reporting on customer execution health, risks, and mitigation plans.
Use post-qualification and post-ramp reviews to drive systemic improvements.