Senior Embedded Firmware Engineer

Senior Embedded Firmware Engineer (Safety-Critical Systems)

Location: San Francisco, CA | Los Angeles, CA | Washington, DC
Training Requirement: Candidates must complete an initial 1-month onsite training program in Kearneysville, WV before transitioning to their assigned office location.

About the Role

We are seeking a Senior Embedded Firmware Engineer to develop firmware for a safety-critical embedded system integrated with advanced aerospace and defense hardware. This role offers end-to-end ownership of firmware development, from board bring-up and driver implementation through qualification, testing, and deployment.

You'll work closely with hardware engineers in a highly collaborative, hands-on environment where rapid iteration, reliability, and testability are essential.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain embedded firmware for ARM Cortex-M or comparable microcontroller platforms
• Own firmware architecture, including device drivers, state machines, communication interfaces, command handling, and programming workflows
• Create host-testable firmware and simulation frameworks that enable validation without requiring target hardware
• Collaborate with hardware engineers on board bring-up, peripheral integration, timing analysis, and debugging
• Implement and validate communication protocols and peripheral interfaces
• Support environmental qualification activities, including thermal, EMC, and vibration testing
• Define and maintain firmware safety requirements, verification strategies, and supporting documentation
• Contribute to firmware reliability, security, maintainability, and performance improvements

Required Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional embedded firmware development experience
• Strong experience with ARM Cortex-M or similar embedded platforms
• Advanced proficiency in C, C++, or Rust
• Experience with:
• Interrupts, DMA, clocks, timers, memory maps, linker scripts, and low-power modes
• I²C, SPI, UART, and USB communications
• Hardware debugging using oscilloscopes and logic analyzers
• State machine design for real-world embedded systems
• Board bring-up and low-level hardware integration
• Host-based testing and firmware validation methodologies
• Professional written and verbal English communication skills

Preferred Qualifications

• Embedded Rust experience, including Embassy, embedded-hal, RTIC, defmt, probe-rs, or no_std development
• Modern embedded C++ (C++17/C++20)
• Experience with FreeRTOS, Zephyr, or asynchronous embedded architectures
• Safety-critical firmware development experience (ISO 26262, DO-178C, IEC 61508, or similar)
• Bootloader, DFU, secure boot, or OTA update implementation
• UAV, drone, FPV, MAVLink, INAV, or related aerospace systems experience
• Experience with C FFI or SDK integration

Work Environment

• Collaborative, hardware-focused engineering culture
• Frequent interaction with real hardware and rapid development cycles
• High degree of technical ownership and responsibility
• Focus on quality, reliability, testability, and safety

Additional Requirements

• Ability to complete a mandatory 1-month onsite training period in Kearneysville, West Virginia
• Ability to work onsite from San Francisco, Los Angeles, or Washington, DC following training
• Must be legally authorized to work in the United States

Embedded Firmware Engineer, Senior Firmware Engineer, Embedded Software Engineer, ARM Cortex-M, C, C++, Rust, Embedded Systems, Board Bring-Up, Device Drivers, Real-Time Systems, FreeRTOS, Zephyr, Embedded Rust, Safety-Critical Software, Aerospace, Defense Technology, UART, SPI, I2C, USB, Bootloader, Secure Boot, OTA Updates, Hardware Debugging.