Design Science (DSI) was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Long Beach, California, with an engineering team in St. Paul, Minnesota. We are the worldwide leader in developing, marketing and supporting software for scientific and technical communication. Our MathType, MathFlow, MathPlayer and WebEQ software products are used by scientists, engineers, educators and publishing professionals, for authoring and publishing mathematical notation in print and online documents, and for building web pages with interactive math content. We also license components and technology to many OEM partners who want to math-enable their own products. We aggressively research new products and technologies, particularly those that extend our commanding lead in MathML technology.

What's it like to work at Design Science?

We're perfectionists, and as with most small companies we do more than our "job description". We're intense, we push ourselves and everyone else to do better. We work hard but dress casually and take advantage of free soft drinks, juices, snacks and bagels. Our salaries and benefits are some of the best in the business. We love our jobs.

We want very smart people to join us. Even if your skills don't fit the openings below, we invite you to send a resume. Perhaps we can create a job to fit you.

Design Science locations:

Long Beach, CA: Long Beach is the second largest city in Los Angeles county with almost 1/2 million residents. It is well-known as the busiest port in the country and the home of the Queen Mary ocean liner. Living near the beach has its perks (clean air, best climate in the US) and Long Beach is one of the least expensive of Southern California's beach communities. Our office is located in the heart of downtown Long Beach amidst trendy restaurants and an upscale nightlife. We are located only two blocks from the Long Beach Convention Center. Our central location and quick freeway access makes it easy to visit attractions like the Queen Mary, the Aquarium of the Pacific, the Long Beach Grand Prix, and we are surrounded by world-class hotels, restaurants and nightlife. We are less than an hour from Long Beach Airport, LA Int'l and John Wayne (Orange County) airports. For directions, maps, hotel, and airport information, see Visiting Design Science.
St. Paul, MN: The Minneapolis-St. Paul area, referred to as the Twin Cities, is a dynamic urban center serving the entire upper Midwest region. Located amidst the famous 10,000 lakes of Minnesota, the Twin Cities are famous for recreational opportunities and beautiful natural surroundings with over 130,000 acres of park land and 950 lakes in the metro area alone. Lake Superior, the headwaters of the Mississippi, and the vast, pristine Boundary Waters Canoe area are all within a few hours drive. The Twin Cities are also nationally renown as a cultural center. Home to over 30 live theatre companies, including the renown Guthrie, the Twin Cities are second only to New York in theater seats per capita. Garrison Keilor's A Prairie Home Companion broadcasts weekly from the Fitzgerald Theater, a few blocks from Design Science's offices. Our office in St. Paul, in a historic building designed by Cass Gilbert (builder of the US Supreme Court Building) is connected to the skyways of the downtown district, making access to restaurants, banks, shopping, a quick espresso, just a short walk away all year round. For directions, maps, hotel, and airport information, see Visiting Design Science.
Telecommuting to the virtual office: DSI strongly believes that the future of information work is from the distributed office, working from home or wherever (Starbucks? Your yacht?). Sharp, talented people can choose to work wherever they want and DSI has to take advantage of that. Obviously we can't accommodate telecommuting for all positions but we try to be flexible.

Product Manager, MathFlow (Long Beach, CA or St. Paul, MN)

The MathFlow Product Manager will be responsible for overseeing the marketing strategy and product line vision for our line of XML and MathML editing, rendering, and processing products and technologies. This position will work closely with Development, Sales, Support and Communications to develop strong product plans and manage their timely implementation to meet forecasts. In addition he/she will own the Design Science products and assume a key leadership role in their future direction.

Responsibilities

Serve as product line champion within the organization and demonstrate clear ownership of the product line from initial concept development to end of life strategies.
Develop business plans, product strategies and profitable business models. Assist VP Marketing with product budgets, financials and P&Ls for the products to establish accurate forecasts and profitable business models. Track results of these objectives and ensure products stay on track.
Develop clear product positioning statements and communication strategies.
Work with the Marketing Team to develop: marketing plans, launch plans, packaging and documentation, advertising, direct marketing, PR, promotions, and sales support materials either on the web or in print.
Work with Sales to establish and execute clear plans and objectives and support direct interactions with customers and prospects.
Develop market research plans and independently conduct product, market and customer research including qualitative and quantitative research. Execute the research, analyze results and be able to formulate well supported recommendations that impact the business.
Work with the Marketing Team to conduct thorough market and competitive analyses.

Desired skills and experience:

3-5 years in product management including proven success in creating and implementing product plans that can meet the needs of the target audience and deliver the requisite business objectives.
Experience marketing to the enterprise and/or publishing market is strongly preferred.
Experience with technology products, particularly XML-based ones used in document processing, is required.
Strong track record of consistently creating product visions and delivering products and plans that exceed objectives.
Passion for creating product strategies and on target executions that deliver measurable results.
Ability to create and communicate vision, to obtain buy-in and to lead a cross functional team to carry out and enhance the vision.

You'll be joining a team atmosphere in a thriving small company with highly talented co-workers. Qualifying employees enjoy a solid benefits package. If you are interested in joining us, please email your resume to jobs@dessci.com. No phone calls please.

Senior Software Engineers (Long Beach, St. Paul, or elsewhere)

Design Science is looking for several senior software engineers with 5+ years of commercial development experience spanning the complete product lifecycle. You will be working on designing cross-platform component-level interfaces for new and existing products, using COM and Java technologies. Many of our products interact with other applications (e.g. Microsoft Office), and new opportunities for product integration are continually appearing. Developing architectures and interfaces to simplify these integration tasks is crucial to the continued success of our company. You'll also help implement these interfaces, either working individually or leading a small team.

Requirements:

Outstanding communication, writing and software development skills.
Expert-level technical knowledge of C++ and/or Java.
Experience designing and implementing object-oriented component interfaces (COM or similar).
Strong code design and architecture skills.
Strong computer science, mathematics, or scientific background.

Senior Software Architects (Long Beach, St. Paul, or elsewhere)

Design Science is looking for several senior software engineers with 5+ years of commercial development experience, with knowledge and experience in one or more architectural areas:

PostScript, PDF, font, and other professional publishing-related technologies.
Cross-language object-oriented component systems (Microsoft COM or similar) and their internal architecture.
XML technology as it applies to professional publishing and textual content applications.
Development of Quark, InDesign, Adobe Reader/Acrobat, and web browser plug-ins.
Microsoft Office plug-ins, object models, and applications.

Requirements:

Outstanding communication, writing and software development skills.
Expert-level technical knowledge of C++ and/or Java.
Experience designing and implementing object-oriented component interfaces (COM or similar).
Strong code design and architecture skills.
Strong computer science, mathematics, or scientific background.

MathML Evangelist (Long Beach, St. Paul, or elsewhere)

Design Science has an immediate opening for a person to engage users of mathematical notation at all levels in order to spread the word about MathML as the established standard for math in XML, and how DSI's products and technologies support the use of MathML in a wide variety of contexts. The person in this position will also help our marketing and development staff envision and specify features and products in these areas.

MathML is firmly established as an XML standard, but adoption has been slowed by the fact that all too often end users requiring mathematics are left to fend for themselves when using popular web applications such as blogs, wikis, whiteboards, online assessments and many others. While enabling math support is often not difficult, the burden of learning about MathML and doing the necessary software integration takes it out of reach for many users. A major responsibility of the person taking this position will be to act as liaison to the rest of the XML and content delivery communities, thereby expanding the market for MathML as well and DSI tools and technologies.

XML-based languages are being created every day in virtually all fields of human endeavor where computers are involved. Some are intended for data exchange and other are to represent documents of various kinds. MathML has a place in many of these languages but, often, the group responsible for creating the new language lacks MathML knowledge and either creates a custom, one-off language to represent the math part of their knowledge or leaves it out altogether, promising to address it in a future version. As MathML Evangelist, you will remedy this situation by acting as a conduit of MathML knowledge to these groups.

The person in this position would take the lead in identifying communities of users who need math, and paving the way to math-enable the applications they use. This activity will include raising awareness among users that solutions exist, creating and promoting resources to explain how to use DSI tools to work with MathML, and working with vendors streamline the integration of DSI's MathML software with their applications. Another area of activity will be monitoring emerging XML technologies requiring math support to ensure that support for MathML is taken into account at the outset.

The ideal candidate will have:

Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal
Deep knowledge of MathML, HTML, XML, PDF, and other web and document technologies
A strong desire to succeed in the face of resistance and apathy
Knowledge of mathematics, especially mathematical notation, up to high-school calculus.

Responsibilities will include:

Maintain working knowledge of our products and their features
Work with other vendors to educate them on our products and to help integrate our software into theirs
Work with our researchers on creating grant proposals
Give presentations to education, publishing and XML interest groups
Support our technical people with their work on XML standards efforts
Guide others in the correct use and interpretation of MathML

We're looking for highly motivated individuals who can understand our direction in math editing and publishing and explain it to others. If you are interested in joining us, please email your resume to jobs@dessci.com. No phone calls please.

Independent MathType Testers

Design Science, Inc. is assembling a pool of independent testers who we will call upon for future MathType testing projects. Our plan, when the time comes, will be to enlist one or more of these testers to execute a rigid set of testing routines against release candidates of MathType. We will provide all the testing materials and instructions necessary. This is a paid independent contractor opportunity. Interested parties should email us at qa@dessci.com with the following information:

Your name and contact information. Please include your full name, email address, telephone and mailing address.
Let us know a little about your computer environment. Specifically are you using Windows or the Macintosh or both? Is this a standalone computer or one that is part of a network?
Let us know why you would be a good MathType tester. List your experience with MathType and any other technical experience if any.

Those who express interest will receive program details and a list of program requirements via email.

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