What are the responsibilities and job description for the Technical Applications Manager, Surface Conditioning position at Saint-Gobain North America?
Technical Applications Manager
The Technical Applications Manager plays a crucial role in supporting the sales team by addressing client needs from a process and technical capability perspective. This position ensures that our technical solutions align with client requirements and business objectives.
To achieve this, the manager will collaborate closely with the sales team to understand client needs and provide technical expertise to develop tailored solutions. They will possess a deep understanding of our products, applications, services, and policies to offer top-tier technical support.
The manager will maintain awareness of market trends and the competitive landscape to inform strategic planning and client engagements. In this role, the manager will assist clients in solving technical challenges by integrating product, process, and application knowledge.
Essential Functions:
- New Business Development:
- Collaborate with Sales Manager(s) and leadership to understand client technical needs and align them with our product capabilities.
- Utilize deep technical knowledge to identify opportunities where our products can solve client challenges and add value.
- Collaborate with the sales team to develop criteria that ensure new opportunities are technically sound and align with our strategic goals.
- Work closely with the Sales Manager(s) and leadership to develop and present technical proposals that meet client requirements.
- Manage All Aspects of Ongoing Relationship of Key Accounts:
- Foster strong technical relationships with key stakeholders across the organization, including R&D, engineering, and production teams.
- Ensure seamless communication and collaboration to address client technical needs effectively.
- Communicate detailed technical specifications, forecasts, and product requirements to relevant teams in the plants.
- Assess technical requirements for current and new products based on client feedback and market trends.
- Take ownership of or coordinate the technical response to client inquiries, ensuring timely and accurate information is provided.
- Support Internal Business Processes:
- Collect, analyze, and transmit market intelligence regarding customers, market evolution, competitors, and technology trends in order to guide the direction of new product development pipeline.
This role requires:
- Bachelor's Degree in Technical Science (Engineering/Materials Science/Chemistry or equivalent).
- A minimum of 2 years of commercial (sales, marketing) experience in the technical field, including market research.
- A minimum of 5 years of applications engineering experience in Aerospace, Metallurgy, Electronics, Semiconductor, Industrial polishing/abrasives markets.
- Strong knowledge of ceramic coatings is preferred.
- Digital tools related to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Office (Excel & PowerPoint) is required.
Saint-Gobain Surface Conditioning serves a multitude of high-end markets, with more than 50% of its sales in the electronics industry, and in particular for the semiconductor market. We are making one of the essential products necessary in the production of semiconductor chips and Hard Disk Drive, whose growth is driven by ever-increasing demand on cloud storage, IoT, and EV, supporting our purpose of Making the World a Better Home.
