Sr. Principal System Firmware Authentication Engineer

Ampere; Portland (OR); On-site; USD 226,000 - 339,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Premium medical insurance

401K retirement plan

Unlimited flextime and holidays

Job summary

Ampere Computing is seeking a Sr. Principal System Firmware Authentication Engineer to lead architecture, development, and validation of secure firmware for ARM-based server platforms.

You will drive firmware authentication, secure boot, certificate management, and device attestation, collaborating across hardware, security, validation, ODM, and customer teams throughout the lifecycle.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or advanced degree in a technical field.
• 12+ years of firmware/embedded software or security experience.
• Extensive expertise in C and C++ for embedded software development.

Responsibilities

• Deliver robust firmware authentication and secure-boot across ARM servers.
• Establish scalable certificate, key, signing, and authentication processes.
• Bring up and validate System Control Processor firmware across platforms.
• Enable secure firmware updates and device attestation where required.

Skills

C/C++ for embedded or systems software

ARM 32/64-bit architecture

Secure boot / firmware authentication

X.509 certificates / PKI

OpenSSL / cryptographic libraries

Python / Bash scripting

Debugging and root-cause analysis

Multi-team collaboration

Education

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science

Tools

JTAG/TRACE32/OpenOCD

Git/Jenkins

CMake / Device Tree

Job description

Invent the future with us.

Ampere is a semiconductor design company for a new era, leading the future of computing with an innovative approach to CPU design focused on high-performance, energy efficient AI compute.

Description

Invent the future with us.

Ampere is a semiconductor design company for a new era, leading the future of computing with an innovative approach to CPU design focused on high-performance, energy efficient AI compute.

As a pioneer in the new frontier of energy efficient high-performance computing, Ampere is part of the Softbank Group of companies driving sustainable computing for AI, Cloud, and edge applications.

Join us at Ampere and work alongside a passionate and growing team.

About The Role

Ampere Computing is seeking a Sr. Principal System Firmware Authentication Engineer to lead the architecture, development, and validation of secure system firmware for ARM®-based server platforms. This role will focus on firmware authentication, secure boot, cryptographic services, certificate management, device attestation, and trusted platform capabilities while collaborating with hardware, firmware, security, validation, ODM, and customer teams throughout the product lifecycle.

What You’ll Achieve

• Deliver robust firmware authentication and secure-boot capabilities across multiple ARM® server platforms.
• Establish scalable certificate, key, signing, and authentication processes that support the complete product lifecycle.
• Bring up and validate System Control Processor firmware across virtual platforms, emulation systems, and silicon.
• Enable secure firmware updates, platform recovery, device identity, and attestation capabilities where required.
• Define and execute comprehensive unit, integration, functional, negative, regression, and security testing strategies.
• Improve the reliability and security of firmware interactions with hardware, BIOS/UEFI, Linux, Windows, and other platform software.
• Identify security and functional risks early through architecture reviews, design analysis, and pre-silicon validation.
• Debug and root-cause issues spanning firmware, software, hardware interfaces, operating systems, and cryptographic services.
• Drive complex issues from initial investigation through root cause, corrective action, validation, and release.
• Support multiple products and programs while maintaining alignment with platform architecture and security requirements.
• Deliver high-quality, sustainable code and documentation that can be reused across future platforms.
• Provide technical direction on firmware authentication architecture, implementation standards, and secure development practices.
• Strengthen collaboration among firmware, hardware, validation, product security, RMA, signing, ODM, and customer engineering teams.

About You

• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 12 or more years of relevant experience in firmware, embedded software, platform security, or a related engineering discipline.
• Extensive and demonstrable expertise in C and C++ for embedded or systems software development.
• Deep experience with 32-bit and 64-bit ARM® architecture, including ARM® server platforms and system boot flows.
• Strong expertise in secure boot, firmware authentication, cryptography, platform security, hardware roots of trust, and trusted computing concepts.
• Extensive knowledge of X.509 certificates, certificate chains, certificate packaging, key management, signing workflows, and device identity.
• Hands-on experience with OpenSSL, mbedTLS, or comparable cryptographic libraries and security frameworks.
• Experience implementing or integrating device attestation, measured boot, remote attestation, or related platform-trust technologies.
• Strong understanding of firmware, BIOS/UEFI, Linux, and Windows software development and integration.
• Experience with ARM® firmware bring-up, boot sequences, system initialization, and multi-threaded programming.
• Experience debugging and validating firmware in virtual platforms, hardware emulation environments, and post-silicon systems.
• Strong analytical, debugging, testing, and root-cause analysis skills.
• Demonstrated ability to resolve issues that span multiple firmware, software, hardware, and operating-system subsystems.
• Experience with server hardware interfaces, including SPI, I2C, I3C, DDR3/DDR4/DDR5, PCIe, and related platform technologies.
• Experience using JTAG and debugging tools such as TRACE32 or OpenOCD.
• Proficiency with Python and Bash scripting for automation, testing, diagnostics, and development workflows.
• Experience with Kconfig, Device Tree, CMake, or comparable firmware build and configuration systems.
• Experience with source-control and development infrastructure, including Git, Jenkins, Bugzilla, Jira, or equivalent tools.
• Strong understanding of software development lifecycle practices, Agile methodologies, code review, continuous integration, and release management.
• Demonstrated experience driving features from requirements and architecture through implementation, integration, validation, and production release.
• Track record of writing secure, maintainable, testable, and production-quality code.
• Ability to operate independently, manage competing priorities, and make sound technical decisions in a complex, cross-functional environment.
• Demonstrated technical leadership, including the ability to influence architecture, resolve ambiguity, mentor engineers, and drive execution without direct authority.
• Experience working directly with ODMs, customers, Field Application Engineers, or other external stakeholders on technical issue diagnosis and resolution.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain complex security and firmware concepts to both technical and nontechnical audiences.

What We’ll Offer

At Ampere we believe in taking care of our employees and providing a competitive total rewards package that includes base pay, cash long-term incentive, and comprehensive benefits. The full base pay range for this role is between $225,500 and $338,500, except in the San Francisco Bay Area where the range is between $237,000 and $356,000.

Our benefits include health, wellness, and financial programs that support employees through every stage of life.

Benefit Highlights Include

• Premium medical insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance, as well as income protection and a 401K retirement plan, so that you can feel secure in your health and financial future.
• Unlimited Flextime and 10+ paid holidays so that you can embrace a healthy work-life balance.
• A variety of healthy snacks, energizing espresso, and refreshing drinks to keep you fueled and focused throughout the day.

And there is much more than compensation and benefits. At Ampere, we foster an inclusive culture that empowers our employees to do more and grow more. We are excited to share more about our career opportunities with you through the interview process. Our benefits include health, wellness, and financial programs that support employees through every stage of life.

Ampere is an inclusive and equal opportunity employer and welcomes applicants from all backgrounds. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, national origin, citizenship, religion, age, veteran and/or military status, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, physical or mental disability, or any other basis protected by federal, state or local law.