Lead High-Speed SerDes Bring-Up Validation Engineer

Socket.dev; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 185,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Astera Labs, a leader in intelligent connectivity, seeks a Principal SerDes Bring-up Validation Engineer to lead end-to-end post-silicon bring-up, validation, and characterization. You will translate design requirements into measurable tests, drive schedules, and mentor across teams in a hyper-growth environment.

You will collaborate with AMS design, firmware, and system teams to build automated test frameworks, debug analog and digital interactions, and deliver data-driven recommendations that

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or related field.
• 8-12 years of hands-on experience in mixed-signal, high-speed lab environments.
• Proven post-silicon validation and bring-up of high-speed PHYs or retimers.
• Deep understanding of NRZ and PAM4 architectures and high-speed building blocks.
• Practical experience bringing up retimers, including equalization tuning and link sequencing.
• Strong programming ability in Python and C/C++ for test automation and data analysis.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and execute bring-up plans; own post-silicon bring-up and characterization strategies.
• Drive design reviews and specification alignment to ensure testability and verification.
• Lead hands-on test execution, bring-up, and performance benchmarking with rapid iterations.
• Build and maintain automation frameworks for data capture and analysis pipelines.
• Debug and optimize system performance across analog, digital, firmware, and protocol layers.
• Root-cause cross-domain failures and coordinate with design, package, and firmware teams to implement fixes.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to deliver detailed results and validation reports.
• Document findings and improve methodologies with clear debug reports and summaries.
• Develop test software and platform integrations using Python to support regression suites.
• Measure and communicate impact with data-driven conclusions for product direction.
• Define validation metrics and track coverage and defect trends to influence release decisions.

Skills

Python

C/C++

Post-silicon bring-up

Mixed-signal testing

Lab instrumentation

Data analysis

Debugging

Test automation

Education

Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or related field

MS or PhD preferred

Tools

Protocol analyzers

BERTs

Oscilloscopes

TDRs

VNAs

Job description

Astera Labs, a leader in intelligent connectivity, seeks a Principal SerDes Bring-up Validation Engineer to lead end-to-end post-silicon bring-up, validation, and characterization. You will translate design requirements into measurable tests, drive schedules, and mentor across teams in a hyper-growth environment.

You will collaborate with AMS design, firmware, and system teams to build automated test frameworks, debug analog and digital interactions, and deliver data-driven recommendations that