Optical Engineer - Advanced HAMR Light Delivery

Headway Technologies; Milpitas (CA); On-site; USD 121,000 - 178,000; Full time

Job summary

Headway Technologies in Milpitas, CA, is seeking an Optical Engineer to design and mature advanced HAMR optical delivery systems. You will lead concept development, perform simulations, validate experiments, and collaborate with process, test, metrology, and product teams to translate ideas into scalable solutions.

The role emphasizes theory, modeling, experimentation, and practical engineering to advance HAMR technology, with a strong emphasis on manufacturability and robustness.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree in Optical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Applied Physics or equivalent; PhD preferred.
• 2 years of experience in optics, plasmonics, silicon photonics, or optical chip design.
• Strong hands-on testing experience: transmittance, reflectance, far-field diffraction.

Responsibilities

• Develop and evaluate innovative optical design concepts for HAMR light delivery systems.
• Perform advanced optical simulations using Lumerical, Tidy3D, COMSOL to model propagation and coupling.
• Apply inverse design and computational photonics to explore new design spaces.
• Investigate new optical architectures to improve energy delivery to the NFT while reducing loss.
• Use simulation and experimental data to identify material or geometry improvements.
• Maintain optical instrumentation and develop metrologies for HAMR heads.
• Collaborate with process engineering to mature concepts toward product integration.
• Coordinate with testing to characterize laser diode, light path, and NFT performance.

Skills

Optical engineering

Modeling & simulation

Experimental validation

Programming AI tools

Collaboration across teams

Education

Master’s degree in Optical/Electrical Engineering

PhD preferred

Tools

Lumerical

COMSOL

Tidy3D

TEM

EELS

XPS

Job description

Headway Technologies in Milpitas, CA, is seeking an Optical Engineer to design and mature advanced HAMR optical delivery systems. You will lead concept development, perform simulations, validate experiments, and collaborate with process, test, metrology, and product teams to translate ideas into scalable solutions.

The role emphasizes theory, modeling, experimentation, and practical engineering to advance HAMR technology, with a strong emphasis on manufacturability and robustness.