Job opening: DevOps engineer / all-round computer scientist

26 June 2020

We are a growing and profitable scientific software company in Amsterdam, developing and marketing software in computational quantum chemistry and materials science for over 25 years. We have grown quite rapidly to around 20 developers over the last few years and are currently implementing scalable software development processes that allow for further sustainable growth in the future. To support this, we now create a job opening with prospect of permanent employment for an all-round computer scientist as DevOps engineer, preferably with experience in Continuous Integration and Deployment. Together with our software architects and system administrator you will work on defining and technically supporting scalable automated software development processes that allow us to get our software quickly and reliably from our scientific software engineers to thousands of industrial and academic end users around the world.

Job requirements

  • Practical experience (work or studies) in (automated) building (compiling, linking, packaging) complex, multi-component, mixed-language software packages for a wide variety of systems: from a Windows laptop, through Mac workstations, to Linux supercomputers and the cloud.
  • Practical experience (work or studies) with software development processes and standard tools to implement them: version control (Git, Subversion), continuous integration and deployment (e.g. Jenkins), issue trackers (Jira), …
  • Excellent knowledge of and experience with Python.
  • Be willing to share in other generic development tasks such as complex website related tasks, our Customer Relation Management system with our own extensions, etc.

Desirable knowledge and experience:

  • Familiarity with the ideas and practices of DevOps and release engineering.
  • Experience with virtualization (e.g. Docker) and cloud computing (e.g. AWS).
  • Experience in high-performance computing infrastructure and compute cluster configuration: e.g. job schedulers, MPI implementations, optimized libraries, …
  • Experience with general system administration.
  • Experience with C/C++ and/or modern Fortran.

We will consider experienced applicants but may also consider starters on the job market in case of suitable background and talents. Knowledge of physics, chemistry or material science is not necessary, but a general interest in these topics is a plus.

What we offer

  • This position will initially be for one year but is intended to be extended and become permanent in case of mutual satisfaction.
  • The position is available immediately but there is flexibility concerning the starting date.
  • Competitive salary related to experience, bonus, as well as relocation costs and secondary benefits (including ABP pension fund)
  • 34 holidays per year on top of national holidays.
  • Flexible working hours and the ability to occasionally work remotely.
  • This is a full-time (preferred) or part-time (at least 0.7 FTE) position based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
  • Tax benefits (30% of salary tax-free) are often applicable in The Netherlands (depending on circumstances) for a successful candidate from abroad.

The working environment at SCM

The friendly working atmosphere at SCM is that of an informal small team of PhD-level researchers and scientific software developers doing intellectually challenging work. This environment provides much freedom and responsibility for shaping your own work. Originating as a spin-off company of the VU University, Amsterdam, SCM has its office space on the VU campus, at walking distance from the Amsterdam-Zuid train station. We also extensively collaborate with a growing number of academic groups and household-name industrial partners worldwide.

SCM is a science-focused company which has been around for more than 25 years. It is financially solid, free of debt, growing, and profitable. We are located in Amsterdam, the very lively, internationally oriented, and enjoyable capital of The Netherlands. Thanks to its high quality of living and dynamism, Amsterdam has been elected as best European tech city and 4th most dynamic European city to work in, “best city for Millennials to live”, and it consistently ranks high in Mercer’s annual Quality of Living surveys (11th best in the world, in 2019).

Further information, applying

Detailed information on SCM and its software can be found at https://www.scm.com/

Those interested in this position are encouraged to contact us at jobs@scm.com for further information. Job applications can be sent by email to the same address until 31 July, 2020, but preferably sooner, or until the position has been filled. Applications should contain a CV, a cover letter explaining the motivation for applying and, if applicable, a list of software projects worked on (with own contribution specified). References and source code may be requested at a later stage. The accompanying email should briefly stress already a few key reasons why you might be the most suitable person for the position.

Key concepts