Principal FPGA Engineer

About the role

Please Note: To conform with the United States Government Space Technology Export Regulations, the applicant must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., conditional resident, asylee or refugee (protected individuals as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3)), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.

At CesiumAstro, we are developers and pioneers of out-of-the-box communication systems for satellites, UAVs, launch vehicles, and other space and airborne platforms. We take pride in our dynamic and cross-functional work environment, which allows us to learn, develop, and engage across our organization. If you are looking for hands-on, interactive, and autonomous work, CesiumAstro is the place for you. We are actively seeking passionate, collaborative, energetic, and forward-thinking individuals to join our team.

We are looking to add a Principal FPGA Engineer I to our team. If you enjoy working in a startup environment, and are passionate about developing leading-edge hardware for satellites, spacecraft, and aerospace systems, we would like to hear from you.

In this position, you will be responsible for FPGA circuits and systems through all phases of the development process. The ideal candidate will have experience in FPGA design, verification, test, and deployment at the HDL level. FPGA HDL designs will include high-speed serial interfaces and data streams, digital processing cores, multiple clocks and clock domains, and management interfaces. Testing, validation, and verification will also be central tasks for any FPGA design. Experience in digital signal processing or board-level hardware design is also helpful in the role.

As a principal level employee, you will present engineering design review materials to our customers and executive team, as well as participate in proposal-writing efforts. As such, excellent written and verbal communication skills are required.

Job Duties and Responsibilities

• Develop advanced FPGA architectures, RTL designs, interface solutions, and digital hardware concepts supporting complex products, emerging technologies, and future product capabilities.
• Contribute to the development of new FPGA design principles, implementation techniques, verification methodologies, and engineering approaches that improve product performance and technical capability.
• Lead unusually complex engineering studies, design evaluations, and technical investigations requiring innovative solutions and advanced engineering expertise.
• Direct highly complex FPGA integration, hardware bring-up, verification, debugging, qualification, and design validation activities across critical development efforts.
• Evaluate simulation results, timing closure, hardware performance, laboratory measurements, engineering risks, and system interactions while developing innovative technical solutions.
• Guide implementation of advanced verification approaches, qualification strategies, engineering improvements, and technical recommendations supporting successful product development.
• Serve as a technical advisor to engineering leadership, customers, and program teams on advanced FPGA technologies, complex engineering challenges, and product development activities.
• Lead advanced technical reviews, engineering investigations, customer discussions, and multidisciplinary design efforts requiring specialized FPGA expertise.
• Mentor senior FPGA Engineers while promoting advanced engineering practices and supporting development of technical capability across engineering teams.
• Advance FPGA engineering practices through development of innovative design approaches, verification methods, implementation techniques, and engineering tools.
• Evaluate existing FPGA technologies, engineering methods, and development processes while identifying opportunities to improve long-term technical capability.
• Guide initiatives that strengthen FPGA performance, product reliability, engineering efficiency, innovation, and technical excellence across multiple development efforts.

Job Requirements and Minimum Qualifications

• A Bachelor of Science (BS) or Master of Science (MS) degree in Electrical Engineering or Computer Engineering from an accredited university or institution.
• 15+ years of experience in the design, analysis, and implementation of FPGA systems at the HDL level.
• Expert-level knowledge of FPGA design fundamentals (HDL/HLS design entry, verification, logical and physical synthesis, place-and-route)
• Expert-level knowledge of geographically distributed Linux-based Ci/Cd automation infrastructure.
• Expert-level knowledge of AMD Versal toolchains and flow methodologies using Vivado, Vitis, Embedded Development Framework, AIE and HLS development tools and methodologies.
• Strong foundational DSP skills (NCO, FIR, FFT, etc…)
• Expert-level knowledge of FPGA optimization strategies and tradeoffs for utilization, power, thermal, and compute performance.
• Strong foundational knowledge of UVM(f)-based verification.
• A strong sense of ownership and pride in delivering artisan-grade implementations with a focus on modularity, verification and HIL-based regression gating.
• Maintain a robust training and mentorship pipeline for select early-career engineers.
• Ability to independently execute and deliver very challenging project and prototype concepts without direct supervision.
• Ability to collaborate with the senior technical leadership team while maintaining a positive attitude and growth mindset.
• Ability to maintain, evaluate, apply and drive development from a customer perspective of new tooling and design methodologies as they become available from our industry partners such as AMD and Siemens.

Additional information

CesiumAstro considers several factors when extending an offer, including but not limited to, the role and associated responsibilities, a candidate’s work experience, education/training, and key skills. Full-time employment offers include company stock options and a generous benefits package including health, dental, vision, HSA, FSA, life, disability and retirement plans.

Please note: CesiumAstro does not accept unsolicited resumes from contract agencies or search firms. Any unsolicited resumes submitted to our website or to CesiumAstro team members will be considered property of CesiumAstro, and we will not be obligated to pay any referral fees.