Sr. Staff Engineer - SoC Architect

Qualcomm; San Diego (CA); On-site; USD 179,000 - 268,000; Full time

Job summary

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. in San Diego, CA is seeking a senior System Architect to shape SoC architecture across power, performance and efficiency.

You will collaborate with Hardware design, Software, Product Management and Planning teams to deliver cross-IP solutions for next-generation platforms and workloads. The role requires deep expertise in CPU/GPU/AI accelerators, safety standards, and experience with ISO 26262.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree plus 6+ years in Systems Engineering or related work.
• Master's degree plus 5+ years in Systems Engineering or related work.
• PhD plus 4+ years in Systems Engineering or related work.

Responsibilities

• Research, innovate and provide SoC architecture platforms and solutions across QCT.
• Collaborate with Hardware design, Software, Product Management and Planning teams.
• Develop, model and prototype system solutions for power, performance and cost.
• Communicate experimental results and drive architectural decisions with leads.

Skills

System architecture

Power management

Safety standards ISO 26262

ARM/ISA experience

RTL design experience

Education

Bachelor's degree in EE/CS

Master's degree in EE/CS

PhD in EE/CS

Job description

Company

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.

Job Area

Engineering Group, Engineering Group > SoC Architecture

General Summary

Research, innovate and provide SoC architecture platforms and solutions for all SoC’s across QCT. Engage collaboratively across teams and organizational boundaries, including with Hardware design & Verification, Software, Product Management and Product Planning teams to create leading SoC-wide solutions that provide the best-in-class cost, performance, and power. Develop, model and prototype new system solutions and approaches across functional tech IPs that allow our hardware technologies to be used efficiently and allow our customers to make better use of our hardware. Conduct hands‑on workload analysis including algorithm optimization and analysis of performance and/or power characterizations to help define our SoC architecture solutions. Deploy simulators, profilers, and hardware solutions to provide quantitative justification for architectural directions. Efficiently communicate experimental results, review with technical leads and peers, and analyze outstanding issues. Innovate and develop new cross-IP SoC-wide solutions that enable existing and emerging market SoCs to meet their separate, unique product requirements for these technology areas: Power System, Shared Resource Management, Limits/Thermal Management, Hardware Islands, Debug, Safety, ARM Compliance, Exclusive Monitors and Far Atomics, Coherency, Memory Ordering, Memory Management, Virtualization, Control Processors, Signaling, Compression, Streaming, Always‑On and system level ML.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or related field and 6+ years of Systems Engineering or related work experience.
• Master's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or related field and 5+ years of Systems Engineering or related work experience.
• PhD in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or related field and 4+ years of Systems Engineering or related work experience.
• - 2+ years of experience in one or more system architecture technology areas and products (e.g., Power System, Shared Resource Management, Limits/Thermal Management, Hardware Islands).

Preferred Qualifications

• SOC Architecture and Subsystem architecture deep understanding of one or more subsystems including CPU, GPU, AI Accelerators, Display Controllers, Camera Pre-processor, Infrastructure blocks (DDR, NOC, SMMU etc.) and I/O blocks (PCIe, ETH, CAN, Serial I/O)
• Ability to work with Subsystem Architects and Design leads to analyze failure modes of Subsystems when safety use cases execute and are mapped to these heterogenous compute subsystems
• Knowledge of SOC Infrastructure IP functionality including DDR controllers, NOC/Internal SOC interfaces, Power Management Control, BIST Control
• Knowledge of Safety Feature and Safety Mechanism design (requirements to integration/execution) for high performance, low power SOCs used in ADAS, ADS and IVI systems
• Prior experience with architecture or design or programming of one or more of common Instruction Set Architectures – x86, ARM, RISC V, MIPS etc.
• Hands‑on experience with applying either ISO26262 or IEC61508 safety standards to complex SOCs for Auto or Industrial Safety applications
• Systems Safety Architecture experience to breakdown complex system safety use cases to requirement decomposition at SOC, AI Accelerators, DRAM, PMIC, MCU, Sensors etc.
• Ability to understand SOC and Subsystem level design functionality to analyze safety/failure mode implications of new functions, features added in design.
• Ability to understand and make appropriate safety recommendations to SOC and HW/SW/System issues or HW bugs are found during project execution.
• Prior experience developing, innovating, or optimizing (power/performance/safety) safety features, freedom from interference features at SOC or System
• Experience developing System and SOC level safety concepts and SEooC work products as per ISO 26262
• Experience developing formal safety requirements and assumptions of use at different levels of abstraction including System, SOC level, Subsystem level.
• Prior experience developing or contributing to Safety Manuals at device level SOCs, PMICs, DRAMs, MCUs
• Prior experience performing architecture level safety analysis using FMEA, FTA, DFA and other common techniques
• Prior experience developing and understanding of quantitative safety analysis work products specifically FMEDA at device level, subsystem level (CPU, GPU, AI accelerator etc.)
• Understanding of HW safety development lifecycle and HW safety development processes as per ISO 26262 or IEC 61508
• Familiarity with one or more formal requirements development tools – JAMA, Codebeamer, DOORs, etc.
• Prior experience working with OEMs, Tier1s, other ecosystem partners for explaining System/SOC safety concepts, safety architecture and being able to represent Qualcomm in safety arch meetings with customers.
• Prior experience in driving and/or support internal safety audits and external safety assessments with 3rd party safety assessors.
• Ability to work with domain experts and various stakeholders for SOC projects (SW, Power, Thermal, Security etc.)
• Prior experience in SOC RTL design, verification or post-si validation.
• Prior experience with Safety OS (e.g. QNX RTOS, Safe RTOS), AUTOSAR or Safety SW development for safety critical applications (Auto, Industrial, etc.)

Pay range and Other Compensation & Benefits

$179,000.00 - $268,400.00

EEO Employer

Qualcomm is an equal opportunity employer; all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, Veteran status, or any other protected classification.

Qualcomm is an equal opportunity employer. If you are an individual with a disability and need an accommodation during the application/hiring process, rest assured that Qualcomm is committed to providing an accessible process. You may e‑mail [e-mail] or call Qualcomm's toll‑free number found here. Upon request, Qualcomm will provide reasonable accommodations to support individuals with disabilities to be able participate in the hiring process.

Qualcomm is also committed to making our workplace accessible for individuals with disabilities.

Qualcomm expects its employees to abide by all applicable policies and procedures, including but not limited to security and other requirements regarding protection of Company confidential information and other confidential and/or proprietary information, to the extent those requirements are permissible under applicable law.