Software Applications & Escalation Engineer(Kaohsiung)

*English resume is required*

Position Summary
The Software Applications & Escalation Engineer serves as the primary technical interface between customers, Field Service, Applications Engineering, and Software Engineering. This role is responsible for software development, deployment, installation support, customer escalations, troubleshooting, validation, and software readiness for Cohu semiconductor test and handler platforms.

The position bridges the gap between traditional Field Service Engineers and Software Development Engineers by combining strong software knowledge with customer-facing technical leadership. The engineer owns software-related customer issues from initial triage through resolution while providing structured feedback to Product Development teams to improve product quality, reliability, and serviceability.

Essential Functions / Responsibilities

• Independently design, implement, test, validate, and deploy software fixes, enhancements, and customer-specific solutions for fielded systems.
• Support Sales and Applications teams in clarifying software related requirements, feasibility and implementation approaches.

Customer Escalation Management

• Diagnose software defects and independently implement corrective software changes when the issue falls within the engineer's area of ownership and expertise.
• Develop, test, validate, and deploy software fixes for customer issues and field escalations.
• Evaluate whether issues require local resolution or escalation to global software development teams.
• Serve as the first software development resource for customer-facing issues before engaging centralized engineering teams.
• Provide customer communication, containment actions to avoid the hard down caused by SW issues, recovery plans, and technical status updates.

Software Development & Sustaining Engineering

• Design, develop, test, and maintain software enhancements and corrective actions for deployed customer systems.
• Implement bug fixes, customer-specific modifications, and sustaining engineering improvements.
• Develop software solutions to restore customer production, improve reliability, and reduce recurring issues.
• Perform code reviews, testing, and validation prior to deployment.
• Contribute software changes directly to the product code base following Cohu development processes.

Installation & Deployment Support

• Support software installation, commissioning, upgrades, and release deployment at customer sites.
• Assist with first machine installations and production ramp activities.
• Validate software readiness before customer deployment.
• Execute regression, upgrade, and field-readiness testing.
• Participate in simulation-based testing and release validation activities.
• Identify issues before customer deployment.

Knowledge Management

• Develop troubleshooting guides, installation procedures, and support documentation.
• Capture lessons learned from field issues and escalations.
• Improve repeatability of deployment and support processes.

Regional Customer Support

• Support customers throughout Taiwan and Asia-Pacific.
• Collaborate with software engineering teams across Taiwan, Korea, Malaysia, Europe, and the United States to ensure continuous progress on customer issues and seamless transfer of technical information between regions.

Role Focus / Estimated Work Allocation

• 50% Software development, debugging, and sustaining engineering
• 30% Customer escalation investigation and resolution
• 10% Installation, deployment, and production ramp support
• 10% Documentation, knowledge management, and process improvement