Head of Global Test & Metrology - Semiconductor Industry - 100% | Location: Switzerland

Our client is the global market leader in a niche technology for the semiconductor industry. Their components are engineered into the production systems of the world's leading chipmakers and equipment manufacturers - critical, high-reliability parts that make modern chip production possible. Many engineers and technicians have built their careers there over 15, even 20 years.

They are not a machine builder - they are the critical sub-system supplier that OEMs rely on for reliability, performance, and continuous innovation.

The Role

We are looking for a Head of Global Test Lab to lead a global test and validation organization into its next chapter: a lab that is not only operationally excellent today, but digitally native, data-driven, and scalable across multiple international sites.

You will lead a multi-layered organization of several Team Leads and a combined team of roughly 20–25 engineers and technicians, spanning product testing, applications engineering, and industrialization. Your lab safeguards the performance and reliability of every product platform shipped - through pressure control testing, lifecycle and endurance testing, particle and leak detection, thermal testing, and materials analysis, across sites in Europe, Asia, and North America.

This is a hands-on leadership role. You will spend real time in the lab - not only in strategy meetings - while shaping a five-year vision for how testing, data, and automation come together at global scale.

Tasks

What You Will Own

• Digital Test Lab & Data Backbone

Today, test data lives across disconnected systems and site-specific tools. You will lead the transition to a unified, structured data architecture - enabling data reuse, cross-site analytics, and the foundation for smarter, faster testing decisions.

• Automation & Test Throughput

Many lab processes are still manual. You will drive the automation of test execution and data processing, increasing throughput without compromising the rigor our industry demands.

• Global Process Maturity

With sites in Europe and Asia, and further expansion planned, you will establish common standards, comparable methods, and shared governance - so quality and speed don't depend on which site runs the test.

• Team & Capability Development

You will lead technical leaders and their teams, developing capability across a workforce that ranges from senior PhDs to technicians with decades of hands-on production experience. Your ability to connect with both is essential.

• Customer-Centric & Application Testing

While your primary focus is internal test capability, you will maintain a clear line of sight to how components perform in real customer applications - ensuring the lab stays connected to what matters commercially.

Requirements

What You Bring

• Proven experience leading a technical organization of multiple teams or team leads (not just individual contributors) - ideally 15+ people across more than one location
• Professional background in special machinery sector, semiconductor equipment, precision sensing, or high-end measurement/test hardware
• Hands-on ownership of a lab digitalization initiative - for example implementing a data lake, test data management system, or lab automation/MES integration (not just using existing software tools)
• Genuine, current comfort in a physical lab environment - you know your way around test benches, not just dashboards
• Fluent German (native or C1) and professional English
• Willingness to relocate to or regularly commute to Switzerland (4–5 days on-site expected)

Nice-to-haves:

• Degree in Physics, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field (PhD a plus)
• Experience leading internationally distributed teams (e.g., Europe and Asia)
• Technical familiarity with PLC programming (e.g., Beckhoff), Python for data analysis, or time-series databases (e.g., CrateDB, InfluxDB)
• Experience working with semiconductor OEMs as customers or close partners
• Familiarity with process maturity frameworks such as ISO 17025, Lean Lab, or Six Sigma

You'll join a company where testing isn't a support function - it's a strategic capability that directly shapes product reliability for some of the most demanding customers in the world. You'll have real mandate to modernize how a global lab operates, backed by a leadership team that has already invested in digitalization and automation as top priorities. And you'll do it in a business that has weathered decades of technology cycles by staying exceptionally close to its craft.

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