Sofar is the leading ocean intelligence platform. We’ve built the world’s largest real-time ocean network, turning billions of measurements into insights trusted by scientists, governments, and shipping fleets. Our technology makes the ocean more predictable and sustainable, helping customers save costs, cut emissions, and unlock insights that were once out of reach.
We're seeking a Technical Writer to join our Product team and serve as the bridge between complex ocean technology and the users who depend on it. You'll be responsible for creating clear, comprehensive documentation for our marine sensor platforms, weather APIs, and data visualization tools that power critical decision-making for maritime operations, renewable energy, and climate research. This role offers the unique opportunity to translate cutting-edge oceanographic technology into accessible content that helps customers harness the power of ocean data to reduce emissions and improve operational efficiency. You'll work closely with our engineering, product, and customer success teams to ensure our documentation evolves with our rapidly expanding sensor network and serves users ranging from individual sailors to enterprise fleet operators and government agencies. Please note this will be a 4-6 month contract with option to extend.
Impact You’ll Own:
- Create and maintain comprehensive technical documentation for Sofar's marine sensor APIs, data platforms, and hardware integration guides that enable customers to successfully deploy and utilize ocean intelligence solutions
- Collaborate with engineering teams to document new features and product releases, ensuring technical accuracy while making complex oceanographic data concepts accessible to diverse user audiences
- Develop user-friendly tutorials, quick-start guides, and troubleshooting resources that reduce customer support tickets and accelerate time-to-value for new platform users
- Establish and maintain documentation standards and style guides that ensure consistency across all technical communications as the product suite scales globally
- Work with customer success and sales teams to identify documentation gaps based on user feedback and support trends, then prioritize and address these needs to improve customer experience
- Build and optimize documentation workflows and toolchains that enable scalable content creation and maintenance across multiple products and user personas
About You
- 3+ years of experience writing technical documentation for software products, APIs, or hardware platforms, with a portfolio demonstrating ability to explain complex technical concepts clearly
- Strong technical writing skills with experience documenting APIs, SDKs, or data platforms, including ability to work directly with engineering teams to understand and accurately convey technical specifications
- Proficiency with modern documentation tools such as GitBook, Confluence, Notion, or similar platforms, plus familiarity with version control systems like Git for collaborative content development
- Excellent communication and collaboration skills with proven ability to work cross-functionally with engineering, product management, and customer-facing teams in fast-paced environments
- Self-directed problem-solving approach with ability to identify documentation needs proactively and manage multiple projects simultaneously while maintaining high quality standards
- Experience with markup languages (Markdown, HTML) and basic understanding of software development workflows to effectively integrate with engineering documentation processes
- Bachelor's degree in Technical Communication, English, Engineering, Computer Science, or related field, or equivalent professional experience in technical writing roles
We at Sofar Ocean acknowledge that careers in the marine sciences “... have traditionally been, and remain, non-diverse work environments”, thereby limiting the entry and prosperity of underrepresented groups in the space. (Johri et al., 2021) Many of these same groups are disproportionately affected by climate change, and are often excluded from decision making that directly address their interests and needs.
We are committed to addressing these climate injustices and highly encourage people who identify as women, LGBTQ+, Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) to apply.
It is the responsibility of every employee to contribute to a positive work environment through cooperative and professional interactions with co-workers, customers, and vendors.
Equal Employment OpportunityAll qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other factors prohibited by law.
Top Skills
What We Do
Sofar connects the world's oceans to power a more sustainable future. Sofar unlocks ocean data at scale. We deployed hundreds of Spotters globally to create the world’s largest privately-owned network of ocean sensors that collects 1.5 million real-time observations daily. Our team of ocean scientists assimilates this real-time data into our marine weather forecasts, which are up to 50% more accurate than traditional models.
In maritime shipping, we use these high-accuracy forecasts and vessel performance models to provide optimized guidance and save ships time, fuel, and emissions. We also equip researchers, operators, and innovators with our devices and data to power marine research and sustainable commercial solutions. Customers access data from our global sensor network and deploy our extensible Spotter platform to collect real-time surface and subsurface observations.
Sofar’s team of engineers, ocean scientists, and business professionals is based in San Francisco, California.
