Software Test Engineer

We are looking for a hands-on Software Test Engineer to ensure the quality and reliability of software solutions used in real-world sensing and data processing systems. Optics11 is a deep-tech company developing advanced fiber-optic sensing technologies for challenging environments and applications in energy and underwater security. Our systems enable high-performance sensing and monitoring through advanced photonics, signal processing, and data-driven intelligence. We are expanding our R&D team with a Software Test Engineer who is passionate about quality, structured validation, and delivering robust software in complex engineering environments. As a Software Test Engineer, you will be responsible for defining and executing practical software tests to validate software components (including algorithms, cloud back-end, and user interfaces) that process sensor signals generated by fiber-optic sensing systems. You will work closely with data scientists, signal processing specialists, back-end developers, and software architects to ensure that products meet functional and non-functional requirements. This role requires a hands-on professional with a proactive mindset, a structured approach to software testing, strong attention to detail, and the ability to understand complex technical systems and translate requirements into effective test strategies. Key Responsibilities • Perform functional, integration, regression, system, and end-to-end testing across edge devices, cloud services, APIs, databases, and graphical user interfaces. • Define test strategies, test plans, test cases, acceptance criteria, and automated test scripts for an edge and cloud software platforms. • Identify, document, and track software defects, ensuring clear reproduction steps and proper follow-up. • Collaborate with product owners, developers and engineers to understand system requirements and ensure test coverage. • Contribute to the development and maintenance of automated test frameworks and pipelines. • Test edge cloud behaviour under interrupted connectivity, delayed or duplicated messages, device restarts, software updates, and synchronization failures. • Validate software performance, reliability, and stability under different operating conditions. • Support testing of software running on edge hardware, including hardware software integration in laboratory and field environments. • Analyse test results and provide clear, actionable feedback to development teams. • Ensure traceability between requirements, test cases, and test results. • Integrate automated tests into GitLab CI/CD pipelines and help define appropriate quality gates. • Contribute to continuous improvement of testing processes, tools, and quality standards. • Participate in release readiness reviews and ensure software meets quality benchmarks before deployment. • Join one of Europe s most promising deep-tech scale-ups. • Shape the future of a rapidly growing multidisciplinary R&D organization. • Competitive salary and benefits package. • Enjoy regular team activities and company events. • Fresh team lunches provided 3 times/week. Requirements: Technical skills • Familiarity with test management and bug tracking tools (e.g., Jira, TestRail). • Programming or scripting skills (e.g., Python, C++, Javascript or similar). • Experience developing automated tests using tools such as Pytest, Playwright, Cypress, Selenium, or comparable frameworks. • Experience testing web-based graphical user interfaces. • Experience testing REST APIs, back-end services, or distributed software components. • Experience with Docker, AWS, Gitlab , Linux and CI/CD pipelines. • Ability to design structured, maintainable, and reproducible automated tests. • Familiarity with behaviour-driven development and Gherkin specifications. Qualifications: • A degree in computer science, software engineering, embedded systems, or a related technical discipline or equivalent practical experience. • Proven experience in software testing or quality assurance. • Strong understanding of software testing methodologies and lifecycle. • Experience with both exploratory/manual testing and automated testing. • Experience testing integrated systems rather than only isolated software components. • Proactive in identifying risks and gaps in requirements and investigating failures across multiple system components. • Pragmatic and hands-on when working with hardware, software, test environments, and imperfect real-world data. • Able to work independently while collaborating closely with different engineering disciplines. • Able to communicate technical problems and quality risks clearly to both technical and non-technical stakeholders. Nice to Have: • Experience with AWS or another cloud platform. • Experience testing data-driven or signal-processing systems. • Knowledge of embedded systems and hardware software integration. • Experience testing unreliable-network, offline, reconnection, synchronization, and recovery scenarios. • Experience in high-tech, industrial, or defense-related environments. • Experience with LabVIEW Security & Compliance: You'll be working with clients in the defense and security sectors, obtaining a Certificate of No Objection issued by the AIVD (Dutch General Intelligence and Security Service) is mandatory. This means you will need to undergo a security screening. For more information, please refer to details on security screening.