Lead GPU Driver & System Engineer

European Tech Recruit; Cambourne; On-site; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

European Tech Recruit are partnering with a leading fabless semiconductor company in Cambourne to hire a Principal GPU Driver & System Engineer. You will architect, develop, and optimize driver software across Vulkan, DirectX, OpenGL ES, and OpenCL, working close to hardware to maximize performance and stability.

You will operate across API design, kernel drivers, firmware, and hardware architecture, lead complex debugging, mentor engineers, and influence next‑generation GPU architecture with

Qualifications

• Experience of building GPU drivers, graphics systems, or low-level systems software.
• Fluent in C/C++ and comfortable working close to hardware.
• Deep expertise in APIs such as Vulkan, DirectX 12, OpenCL, or OpenGL ES.
• Understand GPU internals at a deep level, including memory hierarchies, command submission, scheduling, synchronization, pipeline architecture, and performance bottlenecks.
• Enjoy working across boundaries—from API design to kernel drivers, firmware, compiler interaction, and hardware architecture.

Responsibilities

• Architect, develop, and optimize features for industry-standard APIs including Vulkan, DirectX, OpenGL ES, and OpenCL.
• Work deep in kernel-mode drivers and GPU firmware to improve hardware control, stability, scheduling, memory management, and execution efficiency.
• Identify, analyze, and eliminate bottlenecks across the stack — including driver overhead, memory bandwidth, GPU scheduling, compute throughput, and power/performance tradeoffs.
• Partner closely with Architecture, Micro-architecture, Compiler, and GPU Model teams to influence next-generation GPU design and ensure the software stack fully leverages the hardware.
• Lead complex debug efforts, guide design decisions, mentor engineers, and help raise the technical bar across the GPU driver team.
• You are not restricted to only the API layer, kernel driver, firmware, or performance. You can work across the entire GPU software stack.
• Your software insights will directly influence next-generation GPU architecture and micro-architecture.
• Your contributions will help turn silicon capability into real-world graphics, compute, and AI performance.

Skills

C/C++

GPU drivers

Graphics APIs

Kernel mode

Performance analysis

Hardware know-how

Tools

Vulkan

DirectX 12

OpenCL

OpenGL ES

Job description

European Tech Recruit are partnering with a leading fabless semiconductor company in Cambourne to hire a Principal GPU Driver & System Engineer. You will architect, develop, and optimize driver software across Vulkan, DirectX, OpenGL ES, and OpenCL, working close to hardware to maximize performance and stability.

You will operate across API design, kernel drivers, firmware, and hardware architecture, lead complex debugging, mentor engineers, and influence next‑generation GPU architecture with