CPU Verification Engineer

NUVACORE; Santa Clara (CA); On-site; USD 140,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

NUVACORE is building a high‑performance, low‑power CPU and seeks Verification Engineers at Senior and Principal levels to strengthen the DV team in Santa Clara, CA. You will design test plans, environments, checkers, and coverage to exercise the pipeline end‑to‑end long before silicon.

You will collaborate with architecture and RTL to debug failures, close coverage, and drive sign‑offs on complex CPU features.

Qualifications

• Degree in Electrical/Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or equivalent practical experience.
• 4+ years (Senior) or 15+ years (Principal) of design‑verification experience, ideally on CPU or complex digital design.
• Strong knowledge of CPU micro-architecture: pipelines, out‑of‑order execution, and branch prediction.
• Hands‑on verification: test plans, testbenches, checkers and coverage writing.

Responsibilities

• Plan & Strategy: drive verification scope, strategy, and test plans for the CPU design.
• Environment Setup: build and maintain robust verification environments and coverage.
• Test & Debug: generate directed and random tests in assembly, C, or RIS.
• Performance Verification: correlate RTL against models; analyze throughput and predictions.
• Coverage Closure: define coverage space and analyze metrics to prove test completeness.
• Cross‑functional Collaboration: partner with architecture and RTL for fixes and bring‑up.

Skills

CPU verification

SystemVerilog

C/C++

Python scripting

Testbenches

Coverage

Education

Bachelors in Electrical/Computer Engineering or Computer Science

Tools

SystemVerilog

C/C++

Python

Job description

Nuvacore is building a ground-up high performance, low-power CPU for next‑generation compute workloads. We are seeking Verification Engineers at multiple levels — from Senior Engineer to Principal level — to help prove the correctness of the Nuvacore CPU. As part of the design verification (DV) team, you will help verify by building the test plans, environments, and checkers that find deep bugs in the pipeline long before silicon, working shoulder-to-shoulder with architecture and RTL design.

THE ROLE

• Plan & Strategy: Drive the verification scope, strategy, and test plans for the CPU at unit and/or top level of the CPU design.
• Environment Setup: Build, maintain, and scale robust verification environments — stimulus generators, checkers, transactors, and coverage — that exercise the pipeline end to end.
• Test & Debug: Generate complex directed and random tests in assembly, C, or random instruction sequences (RIS) to expose corner cases such as speculation, hazards, flushes, and retirement ordering.
• Performance Verification: Partner with architects to correlate RTL against performance models, hunting throughput, stall, and branch‑prediction‑accuracy issues.
• Coverage Closure: Define the coverage space, write functional coverage monitors, and analyze metrics to prove the test plan is complete.
• Cross‑functional Collaboration: Partner with architecture and RTL teams to root‑cause failures, drive design fixes, and support emulation, FPGA, and silicon bring‑up.

Requirements — Must Have

• Degree in Electrical/Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or equivalent practical experience.
• 15+ years (Principal) or 4+ years (Senior Engineer) of design‑verification experience, ideally on a CPU or complex digital design.
• Strong knowledge of CPU micro‑architecture and digital logic — pipelines, out‑of‑order execution, and branch prediction.
• Hands‑on functional verification: test plans, testbenches, checkers, transactors, and coverage.
• Proficiency in C/C++ and/or SystemVerilog, plus a scripting language (Python; Perl a plus).
• Experience writing and debugging tests in assembly for CPU verification.

Requirements — Nice To Have

• Experience on one or more of Front‑end / execution‑unit verification, load/store cache verification, SoC/System verification, Debug/Power mgmt verification.
• Random instruction sequence (RIS) stimulus generation.
• Constrained‑random verification and coverage‑driven closure.
• Assertions and formal verification.
• Emulation/FPGA and silicon bring‑up and debug (waveforms, trace).
• Driving a verification problem end‑to‑end to sign‑off.

We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications, analyzing resumes, or assessing responses and identifying potential inconsistencies or verification signals in application materials based on available information. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans. If you would like more information about how your data is processed, please contact us.