Hardware Design Engineer

Game 7 Staffing; Costa Mesa (CA); On-site; USD 96,000 - 165,000; Full time

Job summary

Game 7 Staffing seeks engineers to support hardware development for an electromechanical propulsion product. You will conduct architectural investigations, perform root cause analysis, and support hardware–software integration across the full hardware lifecycle.

Candidates should have deep experience in analog, digital and power electronics, sensors, motor drivers, and PCB design; familiarity with Altium Designer and Cadence is desired.

Qualifications

• Hardware design experience across the hardware development lifecycle.
• Experience with analog, digital and power electronics; sensors and motor drivers.
• Ability to explain buck-converter operation and related losses.
• Ability to select inductors/capacitors for ripple requirements and voltage ripple.
• Knowledge of high-side buck drive concepts: charge pump, bootstrap, bias supply, gate driver.
• Explain switching losses and linear-mode FET operation with datasheet checks.
• Ability to draw non-inverting and differential amplifier schematics and equations.
• Explain anti-aliasing filters, PCB placement, cutoff frequency, sampling for 150 kHz.

Responsibilities

• Conduct architectural investigations across hardware platforms.
• Perform root cause and worst-case analysis.
• Support hardware–software integration during development.
• Improve manufacturing scalability across the full hardware lifecycle.
• Collaborate on hardware for an electromechanical propulsion product.

Skills

Hardware lifecycle

Analog electronics

Digital electronics

Power electronics

Sensors

PCB design

Buck-converter concepts

Gate drive concepts

PCB layout basics

I2C/SPI familiarity

Tools

Altium Designer

Cadence

RCAD

Mentor Graphics

Job description

Location: On-site at HQ — Costa Mesa, CA (initial 6-month duration)

Contract: 6 months to start

Start: New hires should become productive within ~1 week via on-the-job training

Interview Process

• Phone screen
• Technical interview
• Panel interview at the Costa Mesa office

Security / Clearance: US citizenship required

Why Hiring

Hiring ~7 engineers to support hardware development tasks for an electromechanical propulsion product over a 6-month period.

End Product: Electromechanical propulsion product hardware

Tech / Domain Environment

• Altium Designer is the primary required tool
• Cadence, RCAD, or Mentor Graphics experience offers some flexibility
• Aerospace experience is not required — domain expertise matters more than industry background
• Covers analog, digital, and power electronics, especially:
• Sensors

Job Duties

• Conduct architectural investigations
• Perform root cause analysis
• Perform worst-case analysis
• Support hardware–software integration
• Improve manufacturing scalability
• Work across the full hardware development lifecycle (not primarily a test engineer role)
• Support hardware development for an electromechanical propulsion product

Must Haves

• Hardware design engineering experience across the hardware development lifecycle
• Experience with analog, digital, and power electronics
• Experience with sensors, motor drivers, and PCB design
• Explain buck-converter operation, including inductor current paths when the gate pulse is high and low
• Select a buck-converter inductor using % current-ripple range and a capacitor using % voltage-ripple range
• Explain high-side buck-converter switch drive concepts: charge pump, bootstrap, isolated bias supply, gate driver — and which option to use and why
• Explain switching and conduction losses in a buck-converter FET (equations / how to find switching-loss equation)
• Explain linear-mode FET operation and losses (loss equation + datasheet checks for linear operation)
• Draw non-inverting amplifier and differential amplifier schematics and provide the Vin ? Vout equation
• Explain anti-aliasing filters, PCB placement, cutoff-frequency formula, and sampling frequency for a 150 kHz signal
• Draw the physical I2C circuit (master ? slave) and explain clock and data lines
• Draw the physical SPI circuit (master ? slave) and explain MOSI, MISO, CS, and Clock
• Propose and justify a 6-layer PCB stackup distributing power, ground, and signal layers for analog sensors, a power supply, and a microcontroller

Nice to Haves

• Cadence, RCAD, or Mentor Graphics familiarity
• Product experience in propulsion
• Experience bands represented across openings: ~2–4 years, 4–8 years, or 8+ years