Senior Designated Support Engineer

As a Senior Designated Support Engineer at DDN, you will deliver an exceptional customer experience by applying deep technical expertise to support and troubleshoot complex storage environments across the EMEA region. In this role, you will work closely with customers, internal engineering teams, and global support teams to diagnose and resolve complex technical challenges and ensure the reliable operation of DDN’s high-performance storage platforms.

This position supports multiple strategic customer accounts across EMEA operating within DDN’s global follow-the-sun support model. Engineers collaborate across regional support teams to provide continuous support coverage and ensure seamless case handoffs between EMEA, APAC, and Americas teams.

As a senior technical resource, you will take ownership of complex escalations, guide troubleshooting efforts, and contribute to improving product quality and customer success.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

The essential duties and responsibilities include but are not limited to:

• Provide advanced technical support for DDN storage solutions and associated technologies across EMEA customer environments.
• Support multiple strategic customer accounts as part of DDN’s global follow-the-sun support model, ensuring effective collaboration and seamless case handoffs with engineering and support teams across EMEA, APAC, and the Americas.
• Serve as a senior technical escalation point for complex customer issues and high-priority incidents.
• Troubleshoot and resolve issues related to Lustre parallel file systems and large-scale storage environments.
• Work directly with customer administrators and infrastructure teams to diagnose and resolve complex system issues.
• Collaborate with engineering teams to improve product quality through customer feedback, root cause analysis, and field insights.
• Develop and execute test plans and procedures for system upgrades, maintenance activities, and troubleshooting.
• Contribute to the development and improvement of internal troubleshooting tools and support processes.
• Review and contribute to internal and external technical documentation.
• Clearly communicate complex technical concepts to customers with varying levels of technical expertise.
• Build strong, trusted relationships with key customer stakeholders.
• Mentor junior support engineers and contribute to knowledge sharing across the global support organization.
• Manage multiple priorities while ensuring high levels of customer satisfaction.
• Participate in a rotating on-call support schedule for EMEA customer environments.
• Ability to work flexible hours when required to support EMEA time zones and global customer operations.
• Occasional travel within EMEA may be required for customer engagements or on-site troubleshooting.

SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE

• Successful candidates will demonstrate deep technical knowledge of high-performance storage systems, Linux-based environments, networking fundamentals, and advanced troubleshooting techniques.
• Strong communication and customer-facing skills are essential, including the ability to collaborate effectively with customers through phone, virtual meetings, and written communications.

MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS

• 7+ years of experience in technical support, systems engineering, or infrastructure engineering roles.
• Strong experience supporting Linux-based storage or high-performance computing environments.
• Experience supporting complex enterprise infrastructure platforms in post-sales environments.
• Proven expertise in diagnosing and resolving complex system and infrastructure issues.
• Excellent customer communication and stakeholder management skills.
• Ability to work effectively both independently and as part of a distributed global technical team.

ESSENTIAL TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

• Extensive experience working with Lustre parallel file systems including administration, implementation, or support.
• Strong expertise in Linux operating systems and system administration.
• Deep understanding of system infrastructure including:
  • Storage platforms
  • Linux operating systems
  • Networking fundamentals
  • Parallel file systems
• Strong knowledge of data storage technologies including RAID, erasure coding, distributed storage architectures, and large-scale storage systems.
• Solid understanding of networking technologies including Ethernet, TCP/IP, routing, and network troubleshooting.

PREFERRED TECHNICAL EXPERIENCE

• Experience with other parallel file systems such as Spectrum Scale or StorNext.
• Experience writing or debugging scripts using Shell, Python, or Perl.
• Experience working with InfiniBand and high-speed Ethernet networking environments.
• Familiarity with NAS protocols including NFS, CIFS/SMB, S3, FTP, and SFTP.
• Experience with authentication systems such as Active Directory or LDAP.
• Experience troubleshooting complex networking environments including InfiniBand and Ethernet networks.