Sr. Software Engineering Manager (Pre/Post)

At Cadence, we hire and develop leaders and innovators who want to make an impact on the world of technology.

Position Summary

We are seeking a highly motivated development leader with proven experience managing pre-processing and post-processing teams to join our Apex organization. The successful candidate will be responsible for leading the pre-processing and post-processing domains for Apex in China and collaborating with cross-functional teams to deliver high-quality software releases that support business objectives.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the pre-processing and post-processing engineering teams responsible for simulation software capabilities, including model setup, solver integration, results visualization, and workflow automation.
• Own the technical execution and delivery of MSC Apex pre- and post-processing features, ensuring alignment with product roadmap, release milestones, and business priorities.
• Provide technical leadership for CAE model preparation, results import, visualization, plotting, animation, and report generation workflows.
• Translate customer needs, usability gaps, and technical challenges into actionable engineering plans and product improvements.
• Guide architecture, design reviews, feasibility evaluations, technical risk assessments, and implementation strategies for complex CAE workflows.
• Drive engineering excellence through improved development practices, code quality, performance optimization, automation, maintainability, and test coverage.
• Manage project planning, sprint execution, resource allocation, dependency tracking, and delivery commitments across multiple releases.
• Troubleshoot complex technical and operational issues, including customer escalations, production defects, performance bottlenecks, and workflow failures.
• Mentor and grow engineers and technical leads, building domain expertise in pre-processing, post-processing, and simulation workflows.
• Promote collaboration, knowledge sharing, and technical alignment across geographically distributed teams.
• Support long-term modernization initiatives, including platform scalability, workflow automation, API enablement, cloud readiness, and integration with broader simulation ecosystems.

Required Qualifications

Education

• Bachelors or Masters in Computer Aided Design/Mechanical engineering or related engineering domains

Experience

• 20+ years of software engineering experience, preferably in CAE, CAD, engineering simulation, computational mechanics, or scientific software domains.
• Proven experience managing pre-processing and post-processing product areas for simulation software, including model setup, geometry preparation, meshing, results visualization, and engineering workflow automation.
• Strong understanding of CAE preprocessing workflows, including material/property assignment, boundary conditions, loads, contacts, and solver deck preparation.
• Experience with post-processing workflows, including simulation results import, contour/vector/tensor visualization, animation, path plots, XY plots, report generation, and interpretation of solver results.
• Experience working with or managing development for tools such as MSC Apex, Patran, Adams, ANSA, HyperMesh, SimLab, Abaqus/CAE, ANSYS Mechanical, LS-PrePost, or similar CAE platforms.
• Strong technical background in C++ software development, preferably for large-scale desktop engineering applications.
• Familiarity with Python scripting, automation, APIs, and workflow customization for CAE users.
• Experience leading teams responsible for geometry, meshing, solver integration, results processing, visualization, and user workflow productivity.
• Ability to guide architecture and technical decisions for scalable, maintainable, and high-performance simulation software components.
• Experience collaborating with product management, QA, solver teams, application engineers, customer support, and field teams to define requirements and deliver product releases.
• Track record of mentoring senior engineers and technical leads in specialized CAE software domains.
• Experience balancing technical debt, modernization, performance improvements, usability, quality, and delivery commitments.
• Practical experience using AI-assisted software development tools such as GitHub Copilot, Cursor, or similar tools to improve coding productivity, code review efficiency, documentation, and engineering workflows.

Soft Skills

• Strong people leadership skills with the ability to mentor engineers, set expectations, provide feedback, and build a high-performing delivery-focused team.
• Excellent communication skills for working with engineering teams, product stakeholders, QA, program management, and senior leadership.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to make practical decisions under technical and schedule constraints.
• Ability to drive accountability, remove execution blockers, and maintain focus on predictable, high-quality delivery.
• Collaborative mindset with the ability to influence across teams and build alignment around technical priorities and delivery commitments.N/A We’re doing work that matters. Help us solve what others can’t.