Hybrid Firmware Engineer III – Field Programmable Gate Array, Hardware Design

at Sierra Nevada Corporation

• Job title: Firmware Engineer III – Field Programmable Gate Array, Hardware Design
• Job type: Full Time
• Experience level: Mid level, Senior
• Salary: $108,497 - $149,183 per year
• Degree requirement: Bachelor's Degree
• Tech skills: Cypress, Python
• Location requirements: Hybrid, Folsom, United States

About the role

• Firmware Design Engineer developing FPGA and SoC architectures for the Department of Defense. Collaborating with multi-disciplinary teams to implement advanced firmware designs and testing.

Responsibilities

• Implement advanced firmware designs (FPGA, SoCs, SOMs)
• Test and verification of FPGA/SoC firmware designs through simulations and during hardware/software integration
• Create detailed firmware design documentation and prepare for and conduct internal and external design reviews
• Initiate problem-solving for new and existing product designs, addressing and resolving difficult design issues on challenging projects
• Quick prototype solutions for complex and risky design elements
• Understand, plan, and execute technical activities in accordance with SNC policies, procedures, and specific customer requirements, while ensuring engineering design and development activities meet customer quality, cost, and schedule requirements.
• Develop specifications, control documents, verification and validation plans, procedures, reports, and other documentation to support design and development activities.
• Maintains logs and manuals to document integration and testing
• Responsible for tracking firmware tasks within the Integrated Master Schedule and provide regular updates to the Project Engineer
• Responsible for the design and development of units from concept through qualification testing

Requirements

• Bachelor's of Science degree in Electrical Engineering or other related discipline and typically 6 or more years of relevant experience
• Higher education may substitute for relevant experience
• Demonstrated knowledge of engineering principles and practices
• Understanding of Computer Aided Engineering tools
• Experience working in multi-disciplinary design & development teams
• Basic understanding of digital circuit concepts
• Experience with FPGA HDL development, simulation and analysis, utilizing the VHDL language
• Average to Advanced experience with Microsoft Office Applications (Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Visio)
• FPGA Design Experience using VHDL, with proficiency in Xilinx FPGAs/SoCs (Ultrascale+) and development tools (Vivado, Vitis).
• Experience with Altera, MicroSemi, or Cypress FPGAs is also desired.
• Skilled in state machine design and high-speed digital bus design, including PCIe, Ethernet, USB, SPI, uSD, I2C, and serial interfaces.
• Proficient with static timing analysis for FPGA/SoC designs
• Proficient with scripting (Python, Tcl)
• Understanding of C/C++
• Hands-on experience in the lab with hardware bring-up and unit testing of FPGA/SoC design using standard test equipment
• Experience with integration/debug tools such as digital multi-meters, power supplies, oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, protocol analyzers for serial/USB/I2C/Ethernet, impedance analyzers, and FPGA debug tools (ChipScope)
• Knowledge of interface and design documentation such as Functional block diagrams, Hardware Design Specifications, Hardware Design Descriptions, test procedures, and built-in-test methodologies
• Proven ability to work effectively in a multi-functional, interdisciplinary team environment including collaborating with software and hardware engineers in firmware development, working with systems engineers for requirement definition, specification, and verification, and partnering with project management to meet design cost and schedule objectives.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• The ability to obtain and maintain a Secret U.S. Security Clearance is required

Benefits

• medical, dental, and vision plans
• 401(k) with 150% match up to 6%
• life insurance
• 3 weeks paid time off
• tuition reimbursement
• more