citrin@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU (Wayne Citrin) (01/03/86)
Hello.. I'm a grad student at UC Berkeley expecting to get my PhD in Computer Science sometime by the end of 1986. One of the possibilities I'm considering is getting an industrial research job in Switzerland for a few years. I'm particularly interested in the region around Zurich and in the areas of logic programming and compilation for parallel architectures. I'm more interested in open-ended or "permanent" employment than in "visiting" or "temporary" employment. What I want to know is if anyone out there can give me pointers to companies doing this work, or pointers to people who might be able to give me this information. Also, if anyone has any general insights on working in Switzerland (salaries, availability of jobs, etc.), I'd like to hear that, too. To give a summary of what I've learned and done so far, a visiting Swiss professor told me that there is a great shortage of software engineers in Switzerland and that hiring of Americans, particularly ones from Berkeley, is considered a good practice. He also said that the most interesting jobs are around Zurich, so what I want doesn't seem too unreasonable. I've sent letters to a few of the major companies (not enough of them, I'm sure), and to the embassy in Washington and the consulate in San Francisco. So far, I've only heard from the embassy, where the attache said that he had lots of academic openings, but few industrial openings, but he was forwarding my letter to Niklaus Wirth (I sent him a letter, too). I've also sent a few other letters to professors and other contacts in Switzerland. So that's it. Is there anything I've overlooked? Are there headhunters that handle this kind of request? Any information would be appreciated. If you can, please mail your answers to me; I'll post the information. Thanks, Wayne Citrin (ucbvax!citrin) (citrin@ucbvax.berkeley.edu)