Design Verification Engineer

Velaura AI, Inc.; Santa Clara (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 250,000; Full time

Job summary

Velaura AI, Inc. is seeking Design Verification Engineers to verify its next-generation Physical AI SoC. You will work with architects, RTL and software teams to ensure correctness, performance, and safety across the platform.

The role welcomes engineers at all levels who enjoy tackling complex hardware/software challenges. You will develop verification plans, build environments, and drive pre-silicon validation including emulation and FPGA prototyping.

Qualifications

• Experience verifying complex digital systems.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Understanding of computer architecture, microarchitecture, and SoC design fundamentals.
• Experience with SystemVerilog, UVM, C/C++, assertions and coverage-driven verification.
• Familiarity with formal verification techniques and tools.
• Knowledge of memory systems and interconnects.
• Ability to debug complex system-level issues.

Responsibilities

• Develop verification strategies for key portions of the Velaura SoC.
• Build verification environments using SystemVerilog, UVM, C/C++, assertions, formal verification, emulation, and related methodologies.
• Collaborate with architects and RTL engineers to define verification plans and coverage.
• Verify compute engines, memory subsystems, interconnect fabrics, DSPs, and other SoC blocks.
• Perform HW/SW co-verification with firmware, drivers, and OS interactions.
• Verify performance, latency, bandwidth, QoS, and real-time behavior under workloads.
• Develop assertions, checkers, scoreboards, and automated verification infrastructure.
• Contribute to emulation, FPGA prototyping, and pre-silicon software bring-up.

Skills

SystemVerilog

UVM

C/C++

Formal verification

Debugging

Computer architecture

Verification strategy

Tools

Emulation

FPGA prototyping

AI-assisted verification

Job description

Role Overview

We are looking for talented Design Verification Engineers to help verify and deliver Velaura’s next-generation Physical AI SoC. In this role, you will work closely with architects, RTL engineers, software engineers, and system teams to verify complex hardware blocks and system-level behavior across the entire platform. You will help establish confidence in the correctness, performance, reliability, and safety of the architecture—from individual RTL blocks to complete HW/SW systems running real-world workloads. We welcome engineers at all experience levels who enjoy understanding systems, finding corner cases, and solving challenging technical problems.

Responsibilities

• Develop and execute verification strategies for key portions of the Velaura SoC.
• Build verification environments using SystemVerilog, UVM, C/C++, assertions, formal verification, emulation, and related methodologies.
• Collaborate with architects and RTL engineers to define verification plans, coverage goals, and correctness criteria.
• Verify compute engines, memory subsystems, interconnect fabrics, control processors, DMA engines, and other critical SoC infrastructure.
• Perform HW/SW co-verification involving firmware, drivers, runtime software, and operating system interactions.
• Verify performance, latency, bandwidth, QoS, and real-time system behavior under representative workloads.
• Develop assertions, checkers, scoreboards, and automated verification infrastructure.
• Participate in emulation, FPGA prototyping, and pre-silicon software bring-up activities.
• Drive bug investigation, root-cause analysis, and debug across hardware and software boundaries.
• Post-silicon debug and root cause analysis.
• Leverage modern engineering tools, including AI-assisted verification workflows, to improve productivity, quality, and coverage.
• Contribute to a culture of technical excellence and continuous improvement.

Required Qualifications

• Experience verifying complex digital systems.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Strong understanding of computer architecture, microarchitecture, SoC architecture and digital design fundamentals.
• Experience with SystemVerilog, UVM, C/C++, assertions, coverage-driven verification, and related methodologies.
• Familiarity with formal verification techniques and tools.
• Understanding of memory systems, interconnect fabrics, caches, DMA engines, processors, or accelerator architectures.
• Experience debugging complex system-level issues.
• Ability to work effectively in a collaborative, multidisciplinary engineering environment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with one or more of the following standards: ISO 26262, IEC 61508, IEC 61511, ISO 13849
• Experience with AI, machine learning, or edge AI hardware.
• Familiarity with robotics, drones, autonomous vehicles, or industrial automation systems.
• Experience verifying QoS, latency-sensitive, or real-time systems.
• Experience with HW/SW co-verification and system-level validation.
• Exposure to performance modeling, profiling, and workload characterization.
• Experience using modern AI tools and workflows to accelerate engineering productivity.
• Background in CPUs, GPUs, AI accelerators, networking and communications silicon, storage and data movement architectures, robotics and autonomous systems, automotive and ADAS platforms, aerospace and defense systems,

real-time and safety-critical computing, or functional safety architectures and methodologies.

$150,000 - $250,000 a year

Compensation & Benefits

At Velaura, we believe exceptional talent deserves exceptional rewards. Compensation for this role includes a base salary and very competitive equity compensation, allowing team members to share in the company’s long-term success.

The base pay listed represents a good faith estimate that the Company reasonably expects to pay for this position at the time of hire. Actual compensation will depend on multiple factors, including the candidate's skills, qualifications, relevant experience, and geographic location.

In addition to base salary and equity compensation, Velaura offers a comprehensive benefits package that may include medical, dental, and vision coverage; paid time off; flexible work arrangements; professional development opportunities; and other benefits designed to support the well-being and growth of our team.

Velaura is committed to pay equity and transparency and regularly benchmarks compensation to ensure we remain competitive in the market.

Why Velaura?

Velaura is building next-generation compute technology for cloud, edge, and Physical AI. Our solutions will enable robots, autonomous systems, drones, and other intelligent machines to operate efficiently in the physical world.

This is an opportunity to help build foundational technology at a time when the industry is undergoing fundamental change. You will work alongside experienced leaders, architects, engineers, and operators who have delivered industry-defining products across mobile, cloud, semiconductor, and AI platforms. If you enjoy solving difficult problems, working across disciplines, and helping shape the future of Physical AI, we would love to hear from you.

Equal Employment Opportunity and Accommodations

Velaura is an Equal Opportunity Employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protected veteran status. We also take affirmative action to offer employment opportunities to minorities, women, individuals with disabilities, and protected veterans.

Velaura is committed to working with qualified individuals with physical or mental disabilities. Applicants who would like to contact us regarding the accessibility of our website or who need special assistance or a reasonable accommodation for any part of the application or hiring process may contact us at: [email protected] . This contact information is for accommodation requests only. Evaluation of requests for reasonable accommodation will be determined on a case-by-case basis.

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.