Senior Sales Engineer

About DDN

DDN powers the world's most demanding data workloads—from AI research to drug discovery, autonomous vehicles to financial modeling. For over two decades, our massively parallel storage solutions have enabled breakthrough innovations across industries. Join us in building the infrastructure that makes the impossible possible. The Role
As a Sales Engineer, you'll architect high-performance storage solutions that enable customers to achieve their boldest ambitions.

Work across finance, pharmaceuticals, education, and physical AI—designing systems that power real-time trading, accelerate drug discovery, enable groundbreaking research, and fuel autonomous systems. You'll translate complex customer requirements into elegant technical solutions, demonstrate capabilities through POCs and benchmarks, and serve as a trusted advisor throughout the sales cycle.

What You'll Do
Customer Engagement
Partner with customers to understand their critical data challenges—high-frequency trading, genomics processing, AI model training, or autonomous vehicle sensor fusion

Translate technical requirements into elegant, scalable storage solutions that exceed expectations

Act as trusted technical advisor throughout the sales cycle

Solution Design
Architect storage for AI/ML training, HPC simulations, data analytics, and GPU-accelerated workloads

Design for reliability, resilience, security, and scale—balancing performance with data protection

Create BOMs, system architectures, and technical proposals for complex RFPs

Conduct live demos, POCs, and performance benchmarking

Integrate with GPU clusters, Kubernetes, cloud platforms, and AI frameworks

Innovation & Growth
Stay current on AI infrastructure and storage technology trends

Collaborate with Product and Engineering teams using field insights

Mentor team members and contribute to technical thought leadership

Shape product direction based on customer needs

What You Bring
Technical Foundation (All Levels)
Strong understanding of storage and data architectures: SAN, NAS, object storage, parallel file systems

Knowledge of architectural patterns for reliability, resilience, security, and scale

Understanding of storage and data protocols: S3, POSIX, NFS, SMB

Familiarity with network protocols: TCP/IP, InfiniBand, RDMA

Curiosity about massively parallel technologies (Lustre, GPFS, Exascaler)

Aptitude for AI workloads and how storage enables AI innovation

Ability to communicate technical concepts to both engineers and executives

Entry Level (0-3 years)
Bachelor's in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent experience)

Exposure to storage/systems through coursework, internships, or projects

Strong analytical and problem-solving skills

Customer-facing communication skills

Experienced (3+ years)
3-8+ years in pre-sales, solutions architecture, or technical consulting

Proven track record designing storage/infrastructure solutions

Hands-on experience with enterprise storage systems

Experience with AI/ML infrastructure, HPC, or high-performance workloads (preferred)

Success managing complex technical sales cycles

What Sets You Apart
Genuine curiosity about AI and its impact across industries

Ownership mindset—you solve problems until they're solved

Ability to translate technical complexity into business value

Thrive in fast-evolving technology environments

Collaborative team player with integrity and empathy

Diverse Backgrounds Welcome

Whether you're coming from enterprise storage vendors (Weka, VAST, NetApp, Pure), research computing (university HPC, national labs), or infrastructure roles (cloud architects, platform engineers), your experience translates to this role. Technical depth + customer focus matter more than your starting point.
Why DDN
Impact
Power cancer research, autonomous vehicles, and AI breakthroughs

Work on infrastructure enabling discoveries that change the world

See direct results from your designs

Growth
Master AI infrastructure, parallel computing, and next-gen storage

Learn from world-class engineers and architects

Clear career progression: SE → Senior SE → Principal Architect

Continuous learning: training, certifications, conferences

Team & Culture
20+ years leading storage innovation

Technical excellence and customer obsession

Competitive compensation: base, bonuses, stock options, benefits

Flexible work arrangements

Industries We Serve
Financial Services:

High-frequency trading, risk modeling, real-time analytics

Pharmaceuticals

Genomics sequencing, drug discovery, clinical research

Education & Research

University HPC, AI research, climate modeling, scientific computing

Physical AI & Robotics

Autonomous vehicles, robotic systems, sensor data processing