Staff Engineer, RMA

Qualcomm; San Diego (CA); On-site; USD 128,000 - 192,000; Full time

Job summary

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. in San Diego seeks an RMA Engineer to drive root-cause analysis for customer-returned devices. You will lead cross-functional investigations using ATE, X-ray, CSAM and IV curves, coordinating with Design, Product Test Eng, Manufacturing and Customer Quality teams.

The role emphasizes leadership in issue resolution, metrics reporting, and proactive customer updates to improve product quality and satisfaction.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or related field with 4+ years of Reliability Engineering experience.
• Master's degree with 3+ years of Reliability Engineering experience or PhD with 2+ years of Reliability Engineering experience.

Responsibilities

• Lead major customer issues to resolution and reduce No Fault Found occurrences.
• Conduct technical evaluations of customer returned devices at system and device level using ATE, XRAY, CSAM, IV curve and bench testing.
• Act as conduit between Qualcomm's customer, Product Core Team and CQE; implement processes between Customer/Branch & Qualcomm.
• Track actions, schedules and owners to maintain RMA analysis cycle time; initiate internal corrective actions when needed.
• Drive improvement of internal quality systems to reduce DPPM and improve customer satisfaction.
• Update customers timely on status of open quality issues or support requests.

Skills

Reliability engineering

System-level debugging

Cross-functional teamwork

Root-cause analysis

Education

B.S. in Electrical Engineering

M.S. in Electrical Engineering (preferred)

Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering (preferred)

Tools

ATE

XRAY

CSAM

IV curve analysis

JTAG

Oscilloscopes

Job description

Company

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.

Job Area

Engineering Group, Engineering Group > Reliability Development Engineering

General Summary

As a Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) Engineer in Qualcomm's Customer Quality Team, you will be responsible for resolving product quality issues associated with RMAs. You will be assigned products to support RMA evaluation requests submitted by Qualcomm customers. Defect correlation will be achieved through system- and device-level evaluation techniques, utilizing a variety of fault-isolation and debug tools, including ATE, X-ray, CSAM, IV curve analysis, bench testing, phone testing, and PFA, among others. In this role, you will lead debug and data-gathering activities in partnership with other technical disciplines across Qualcomm. This position offers the opportunity to significantly influence product quality across the organization through direct interactions with customers and collaboration with cross-functional teams, including Design, Product Test Engineering, Marketing, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, and Customer Quality Engineering.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Provide leadership and lead major customer issues to resolution, reduce occurrences of No Fault Found & common mishandling issues such as EOS, ESD, Mechanical damage and SMT Reflow.
• Conduct technical evaluations of customer returned devices at system and device level utilizing tools such as ATE, XRAY, CSAM, IV curve and bench leading to a clear path of root cause.
• Act as the conduit between Qualcomm's customer, Product Core Team and Branch CQE. Introduce, implement, and improve processes (when necessary) between Customer/Branch & Qualcomm.
• Track actions, schedules and owners to maintain targeted RMA analysis cycle time. Initiate internal corrective actions where applicable.
• Drive improvement of internal quality systems with the goal of reducing outgoing product quality DPPM.
• Provide customer prospective (voice of customer) to internal stakeholders with the view to driving customer satisfaction metrics higher.
• Define priority among customer corrective actions to be taken within Qualcomm and guide the implementation within internal teams.
• Generate weekly/monthly/quarterly update reports to problem-solving teams and management.
• Update customers in a timely fashion regarding the status of open quality issues or support requests.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Material Science, Computer Science, or related field and 4+ years of Reliability Engineering (e.g., reliability analysis, stress testing) experience or related work experience.

OR

• Master's degree in Engineering, Material Science, Computer Science, or related field and 3+ years of Reliability Engineering (e.g., reliability analysis, stress testing) experience or related work experience.

OR

• PhD in Engineering, Material Science, Computer Science, or related field and 2+ years of Reliability Engineering (e.g., reliability analysis, stress testing) experience or related work experience.

• 1+ year in a technical leadership role with or without direct reports. (applies only to positions with direct reports)

Preferred Qualifications

• Minimum of 10 years of experience with digital SoC products, semiconductor technologies, and system-level debugging.
• Experience analyzing and debugging customer issues involving application processors, CPUs, GPUs, DSPs, AI/NPU subsystems, memory, power management, and modem technologies, including LTE, WCDMA, CDMA, GSM, 1x, EVDO, and UMTS.
• Experience in microelectronics, SMT processes, semiconductor fabrication, assembly, and product quality engineering.
• Strong experience with quality methodologies, statistical analysis, root-cause investigation, and structured problem-solving techniques.

Desired Experience

• Strong understanding of Digital SoC architecture, including CPU, GPU, DSP, NPU/AI accelerators, cache hierarchy, memory subsystems, interconnects, power management, and clocking architectures.
• Experience debugging complex SoC-level failures, including boot issues, system hangs, crashes, performance degradation, thermal events, and power-related failures.
• Strong knowledge of silicon debug methodologies, failure analysis, fault isolation, and root cause determination for digital semiconductor products.
• Experience with hardware/software interaction, including firmware, bootloaders, operating systems, device drivers, and application-level debugging.
• Familiarity with power management features such as DVFS, CPR, low-power modes, voltage scaling, and thermal management.
• Experience analyzing customer-reported issues involving CPU, GPU, DSP, AI/NPU, memory (DDR/LPDDR), storage, display, camera, audio, connectivity, and modem subsystems.
• Working knowledge of semiconductor manufacturing, assembly, package reliability, SMT processes, and failure mechanisms such as EOS, ESD, latch-up, and mechanical damage.
• Experience using debug and characterization tools such as ATE, JTAG, scan diagnostics, logic analyzers, oscilloscopes, protocol analyzers, X-ray, CSAM, IV curve tracing, and FA tools.
• Strong understanding of silicon validation, product qualification, yield analysis, reliability testing, and customer-return failure analysis methodologies.
• Proven ability to lead cross-functional debug efforts involving Design, Product Test Engineering, Failure Analysis, Manufacturing, Reliability, System Engineering, and Software teams.

Handset/System Knowledge

• Strong understanding of smartphone and embedded system architectures, including application processors, memory subsystems, power delivery networks, display, camera, audio, storage, and connectivity functions.
• Ability to correlate customer-reported failure symptoms with underlying SoC, hardware, software, or manufacturing-related root causes.
• Experience with Android-based systems, system logs, crash analysis, kernel debugging, and performance characterization is highly desirable.

Education Requirements

• Required: B.S. in Electrical Engineering (or equivalent).
• Preferred: M.S. or Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering (or equivalent).

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. (Keep in mind that this email address is used to provide reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities. We will not respond here to requests for updates on applications or resume inquiries).

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 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.

Pay range and Other Compensation & Benefits

$128,000.00 - $192,000.00 The above pay scale reflects the broad, minimum to maximum, pay scale for this job code for the location for which it has been posted. Even more importantly, please note that salary is only one component of total compensation at Qualcomm. We also offer a competitive annual discretionary bonus program and opportunity for annual RSU grants (employees on sales-incentive plans are not eligible for our annual bonus). In addition, our highly competitive benefits package is designed to support your success at work, at home, and at play. Your recruiter will be happy to discuss all that Qualcomm has to offer – and you can review more details about our US benefits at this link.