Senior Forward Deployed Engineer

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As the global leader in high-speed connectivity, Ciena is committed to a people-first approach. Our teams enjoy a culture focused on prioritizing a flexible work environment that empowers individual growth, well-being, and belonging. We’re a technology company that leads with our humanity—driving our business priorities alongside meaningful social, community, and societal impact.

We are seeking a
** Senior Forward Deployed Engineer** (FDE) to join the AI/DC infrastructure routing product team. The FDE will ensure the successful introduction and adoption of our next-generation Petabit-class routing platform targeted s role sits at the intersection of customer architecture and engineering, Ciena R&D, and product management. You will be the technical bridge—embedding with customer labs to validate and integrate our platform, feeding critical insights back to R&D, and guiding the product team to deliver a solution that precisely meets the most demanding hyperscaler requirements.

This is a hands-on, high-impact role where success is measured by the speed and quality of customer acceptance, smooth integration into their infrastructure, and the ability to influence product direction with real-world feedback.
** How You Will Contribute:
*** Lead the certification, testing, integration, and initial deployment of Petabit-class routing platforms across customer environments.
* Collaborate with cross-functional teams including Ciena product, R&D, and account teams to deliver economic value.
* Troubleshoot complex technical issues in real-time and provide strategic guidance to clients.
* Document deployment architectures, operational procedures, and best practices.
* Mentor junior engineers and contribute to internal knowledge sharing.
** Customer Lab Engagement
*** Lead technical engagements with hyperscaler customers during lab evaluations, proof-of-concepts, and pilots.
* Configure, validate, and troubleshoot large-scale routing platforms in customer environments.
* Act as the first line of technical defense for integration issues.
** Bridge Between Teams
*** Translate customer requirements and observations into actionable feedback for Ciena R&D and product management.
* Provide deep input into roadmap decisions, feature prioritization, and usability improvements.
* Document best practices, operational runbooks, and customer integration workflows.
** Control Plane & Protocol Expertise
*** Validate advanced control plane protocols (BGP, IS-IS, IP tunneling, etc.) in hyperscaler-scale environments.
* Assess and tune routing stack performance under real-world workloads.
* Provide deep troubleshooting across management plane, control plane, and data plane layers.
** Technical Enablement
*** Mentor and train internal FDEs, account teams, and customer operations teams on the new platform.
* Ensure compliance with customer-specific lab and production certification standards.
** The Must Haves:
**** Technical Expertise
*** 8+ years in large-scale routing, switching, or data center engineering roles.
* Hands-on experience with hyperscaler or Tier 1 service provider networks.
* Strong background in dual-stack (IPv4 / IPv6) control plane protocols, BGP / IS-IS / OSPF, and the corresponding forwarding plane instantiation (VRF, LAG, E/WCMP, uRPF, et al)
* Familiarity with any of the following data center / SP routing platforms (Arista 7800, Juniper PTX
10K, Cisco 8800, Nokia IXR SRL, etc.).
** Collaboration Skills
*** Proven ability to act as a liaison between customer engineering teams and internal R&D.
* Excellent communication and client-facing skills, conveying technical issues precisely…