Principal GPU Driver & System Engineer

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

Job summary

European Tech Recruit is partnering with a leading fabless semiconductor company in Cambourne to hire a Principal GPU Driver & System Engineer. You will drive architecture, development, and optimization of graphics software across Vulkan, DirectX 12, OpenGL ES, and OpenCL, while pushing kernel-mode drivers and firmware toward higher stability and efficiency.

You will collaborate with architecture and hardware teams, identify bottlenecks, mentor engineers, and influence future GPU design.

Qualifications

• Experience building GPU drivers or graphics systems.
• Fluent in C/C++ and hardware-proximate work.
• Deep knowledge of APIs Vulkan, DirectX 12, OpenCL, or OpenGL ES.
• Understanding GPU internals: memory hierarchies, scheduling, bottlenecks.

Responsibilities

• Architect, develop, and optimize features for Vulkan, DirectX, OpenGL ES, and OpenCL APIs.
• Work deep in kernel-mode drivers and GPU firmware to improve control, stability, and performance.
• Identify bottlenecks across the stack including driver overhead and memory bandwidth.
• Collaborate with Architecture, Micro-architecture, Compiler, and GPU Model teams to influence design.
• Lead complex debug efforts, mentor engineers, and raise the technical bar for the GPU driver team.
• Contribute across the entire GPU software stack beyond APIs, drivers, and firmware.
• Influence next-generation GPU architecture through software insights and contributions.

Skills

C/C++

Vulkan

DirectX 12

OpenCL

OpenGL ES

Kernel drivers

Job description

European Tech Recruit are working closely with a leading fabless semiconductor company, based in Cambourne, who are looking for a talented Principal GPU Driver & System Engineer to join their team.

Responsibilities as Principal GPU Driver & System Engineer:

• 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.
• dentify, 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.

Required:

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

Preferred Qualifications:

• Background in GPU performance analysis, firmware, virtualization, compiler, or runtime optimization for GPUs or accelerators.
• Familiarity with ML/AI workloads, DNN operators and their mapping onto GPU or accelerator architectures.
• Experience collaborating with architects, micro-architects, compiler, and model teams.

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