Senior Firmware Engineer: Mission-Critical Embedded Systems

Somewear Labs; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Equity compensation

Focus Days: No meetings Mondays

Unlimited PTO

Parental leave

Job summary

Somewear Labs is seeking a Firmware Engineer in San Francisco/Chicago to push the boundaries of off-grid communication. You will write production-quality embedded software in C/C++/Rust for Zephyr RTOS on resource-constrained hardware, own features end-to-end, and collaborate with EE and mobile engineers to evolve protocols.

Join a mission-driven team focused on reliability, safety, and impactful deployments in demanding environments.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of firmware development on constrained embedded systems.
• Proficiency in C and C++; familiarity with Rust or motivation to learn it.
• Hands-on experience with RTOS environments (Zephyr, FreeRTOS, ThreadX, or similar).
• Strong working knowledge of serial communication protocols: UART, SPI, I²C, USB.
• Experience with wireless protocols — Bluetooth LE, 802.15.4/Zigbee/Thread, or proprietary mesh.
• Comfort debugging at the hardware level using oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, JTAG/SWD debuggers, and power analyzers.
• A genuine passion for reliability and safety in mission-critical systems.

Responsibilities

• Write production-quality embedded software in C, C++, and Rust targeting Zephyr RTOS on resource-constrained hardware.
• Own features end-to-end — from technical design through implementation, validation, and field deployment.
• Implement and maintain device drivers for peripherals including GPS/GNSS, cellular modems, satellite transceivers, IMUs, and power management ICs.
• Support board bring-up and hardware validation alongside electrical engineers, including schematic review and signal integrity debugging.
• Develop and maintain communication protocol stacks across satellite, LTE, Bluetooth, and mesh radio links.
• Optimize firmware for power consumption, memory footprint, and real-time performance in battery-operated, thermally constrained deployments.
• Build and maintain CI/CD pipelines, automated test frameworks, and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) test infrastructure.
• Contribute to secure boot, OTA update mechanisms, and firmware integrity validation.
• Collaborate closely with mobile engineers to evolve application-layer protocols and data synchronization strategies.
• Participate in code reviews, establish engineering standards, and help define best practices for the embedded team.

Skills

Firmware development

C/C++

RTOS experience

Serial protocols

Wireless protocols

Hardware debugging

Reliability & safety

Tools

Zephyr RTOS

JTAG/SWD

Oscilloscope

Logic analyzer

Power analyzer

Job description

Somewear Labs is seeking a Firmware Engineer in San Francisco/Chicago to push the boundaries of off-grid communication. You will write production-quality embedded software in C/C++/Rust for Zephyr RTOS on resource-constrained hardware, own features end-to-end, and collaborate with EE and mobile engineers to evolve protocols.

Join a mission-driven team focused on reliability, safety, and impactful deployments in demanding environments.