The Senior Software NPI and Release Engineer is responsible for enabling the successful introduction, release, and ongoing manufacture of software-enabled life science instruments. This senior individual-contributor role develops and maintains shared deployment, licensing, installation, and manufacturing-support systems while coordinating software readiness across product development, Operations, Quality, Manufacturing Engineering, Service, and Supply Chain. The role owns the software Manufacturing Readiness Review process and ensures accountable teams provide the plans, evidence, approvals, and corrective actions required at each development gate; it does not personally execute every readiness activity.
This position reports to the Senior Manager, Software Engineering and is part of the Imaging Software Engineering team located in Downingtown, PA. This is an on-site role with no direct reports.
In this role, you will have the opportunity to:- New Product Introduction and Manufacturing Readiness: Own and facilitate software Manufacturing Readiness Reviews from planning through commercial launch. Track owners, evidence, decisions, and risks against readiness criteria.
- Release Planning and Execution: Coordinate scope, milestones, and handoffs for release candidates and gold-master images. Ensure required documentation, quality evidence, training, and approvals are complete and traceable.
- Deployment and Manufacturing Tool Engineering: Develop and maintain installers, launchers, computer-imaging tools, manufacturing utilities, and instrument-configuration utilities. Package and version dependencies and provide requirements and technical support to DevOps for release infrastructure.
- Licensing, Operations Partnership, and Launch Support: Maintain product-activation and license-generation services and support NPI builds and production-readiness issues. Troubleshoot incidents that could prevent Operations from building or shipping products.
- Cross-Functional Software Release Readiness: Coordinate software release readiness across Engineering, Quality, Operations, Service, Supply Chain, and vendors. Drive action closure and maintain Jira, QDIP, burndown, and software release-readiness reporting.
The essential requirements of the job include:- Education and experience: Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline with 5+ years of professional software development, release engineering, DevOps, or software NPI experience; equivalent directly relevant experience may be considered.
- Software development: Strong Python development skills and demonstrated ability to design, debug, test, and maintain production software. Working experience with one or more additional application technologies such as C#, TypeScript, or Angular, and the ability to contribute across unfamiliar codebases.
- Release and deployment engineering: Experience building and supporting software release pipelines, Windows installers or deployment packages, artifact repositories, versioning, dependency management, release notes, and reproducible build processes using tools such as TeamCity, PyInstaller, PowerShell, ProGet/UPack, or comparable technologies.
- Services and integration: Experience supporting web applications or services, REST APIs, authentication or licensing workflows, databases, and server environments; ability to diagnose production issues from logs and system behavior and deliver durable code fixes.
- Product lifecycle and readiness management: Experience applying configuration management, change control, defect management, verification and validation evidence, risk assessment, and release criteria within a structured product-development or quality system, including responsibility for coordinating owners, deliverables, and readiness evidence across multiple functions.
It would be a plus if you also possess previous experience in:- Scientific instruments or regulated products: Software for laboratory instruments, medical or life science products, industrial automation, or other systems combining software, firmware, hardware, and controlled manufacturing processes.
- Software NPI and manufacturing transfer: Manufacturing Readiness Reviews, phase-gate product development, computer gold-master images, manufacturing work instructions, prototype or pilot builds, production process validation, and transfer to contract manufacturers or imaging vendors.
- Product activation and infrastructure technologies: Entitlement, licensing, key-generation, or product-configuration systems, together with technologies such as Docker, MongoDB, Windows or Linux server administration, monitoring, backup, and recovery.
Travel, Motor Vehicle Record & Physical/Environment Requirements:- Up to 10% travel, including occasional overnight travel, to support manufacturing sites, suppliers, product transfers, or internal planning activities.
- This position requires working on-site at the Downingtown, PA location and may require participation in time-sensitive support outside normal working hours when production or product shipment is blocked.
Molecular Devices, a Danaher operating company, offers a broad array of comprehensive, competitive benefit programs that add value to our lives. Whether it's a health care program or paid time off, our programs contribute to life beyond the job. Check out our benefits at Danaher Benefits Info.
The annual salary range for this role is $115,000 - $125,000. This is the range that we in good faith believe is the range of possible compensation for this role at the time of this posting. This range may be modified in the future.
This job is also eligible for bonus/incentive pay.
We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid time off, medical/dental/vision insurance and 401(k) to eligible employees.
Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company's sole discretion, consistent with the law.
Join our winning team today. Together, we'll accelerate the real-life impact of tomorrow's science and technology. We partner with customers across the globe to help them solve their most complex challenges, architecting solutions that bring the power of science to life.
For more information, visit www.danaher.com.
