Senior Global Product Manager - Capital Equipment

Overview

Senior Global Product Manager – Capital Equipment – IS Division
Waterloo, IA or Hybrid / Remote US

Reports to Vice President of Global Engineering

This role sits within a large, complex industrial organization with a global footprint, multi-site manufacturing, and long product life cycles. Products are high value, engineered capital equipment sold through direct sales channels to industrial customers.

Role Summary

The Senior Product Manager is the commercial and strategic owner of a portfolio of capital equipment products, responsible for driving profitable growth through deep customer understanding, strong technical insight, and disciplined product lifecycle management.

This role is highly market-facing and requires frequent engagement with customers, sales teams, and engineering teams. The successful candidate will combine hands-on technical credibility with strategic product leadership
, ensuring products clearly articulate customer value, differentiate in the market, and deliver financial performance.

• Product Strategy & Portfolio Leadership
  • Own the long-term product strategy and roadmap for assigned capital equipment platforms
  • Identify market trends, customer pain points, and unmet needs through direct customer engagement and market research
  • Define product positioning, segmentation, and value propositions aligned to customer workflows and outcomes
  • Drive portfolio rationalization, platform strategies, and investment prioritization
• Customer & Market Engagement (Market-Facing Focus)
  • Act as the voice of the customer, spending significant time with end users, EPCs, and channel partners
  • Lead customer discovery efforts including site visits, operational reviews, equipment start-ups and customer assessments
  • Support strategic sales opportunities by articulating product value, application fit, and ROI
  • Identify strategic market segments and assist in project prioritization to align with customer needs and maximize financial results
  • Understand industry trends, regulations and new technologies that help to shape customer needs
  • Develop a strong understanding of the competitive landscape including organizational strengths and product positioning
• Technical & Product Development Leadership
  • Translate customer needs and application requirements into clear product requirements and business cases
  • Partner closely with engineering to guide architecture / design decisions, feature trade-offs, and system performance targets
  • Ensure product designs deliver measurable customer value (uptime, throughput, safety, efficiency, TCO, etc.)
  • Actively participate in design reviews, validation testing, and field trials
• New Product Introduction & Lifecycle Management
  • Participate in new product introductions (NPI) by supporting APQP launch process
  • Coordinate launch readiness across sales, marketing and technical services
  • Manage lifecycle activities including upgrades, cost reduction initiatives, and end-of-life planning
  • Drive post-launch performance reviews and continuous improvement
• Commercial & Financial Ownership
  • Participate in the analysis and management of product-level financial performance including pricing strategy, margin / cost targets, and growth plans
  • Support forecasting, demand planning, and capital investment decisions
  • Monitor product KPIs and recommend corrective actions to improve revenue, margin, and market share
• Cross-Functional Influence
  • Lead through influence in a matrixed organization across engineering, manufacturing, supply chain, sales, service, and marketing
  • Provide product training and enablement for sales, applications, and service teams
  • Collaborate with marketing on messaging, technical content, and go-to-market execution

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering (Mechanical, Electrical, Industrial, Mechatronics, or similar strongly preferred)
• 5-7+ years of experience in product management, engineering, applications engineering, or technical marketing within capital equipment or industrial systems
• Demonstrated ability to deeply understand equipment operation, applications, and customer workflows
• Proven experience in customer-facing roles supporting complex, high-value equipment definition
• Strong…