PCIe Firmware Expert - Tel Aviv-Yafo, Tel Aviv District, Israel
Originally posted 5 October 2026 by the employer.
Astera Labs provides rack-scale AI infrastructure through purpose-built connectivity solutions.
About the role
This role involves developing embedded firmware that brings Astera Labs' compute connectivity silicon to life, from boot and initialization through link management, telemetry, error handling, and diagnostics. The firmware runs on embedded processors inside chips powering AI infrastructure and interacts with the COSMOS software suite.
What you'll do
- Design and develop real-time embedded firmware in C, including low-level drivers and control logic for complex hardware blocks.
- Own PCIe firmware features end-to-end: link training, enumeration, error handling, and recovery.
- Develop and debug firmware pre-silicon (emulation) and lead post-silicon bring-up and debug in the lab.
- Debug complex PCIe and system-level issues with architecture, design, validation, and customer teams.
- Develop and extend the company SDK in step with firmware features.
- Support customer requests and adjust firmware and SDK development to meet their needs.
What you'll need
- BSc/MSc in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related field.
- 10+ years of hands-on experience as a firmware engineer.
- Proven experience in embedded and real-time firmware development.
- Strong programming skills in C on resource-constrained, bare-metal, or RTOS-based systems.
- Solid understanding of processor architecture, memory-mapped registers, interrupts, and HW/SW interaction.
- Expert-level knowledge of PCIe: LTSSM and link training, enumeration, configuration space, error handling (AER), and reset and recovery flows.
- Experience with PCIe protocol analyzers and exercisers (e.g., Teledyne LeCroy, Keysight).
- Proven hands-on experience in both pre-silicon and post-silicon firmware development and debugging, including silicon bring-up of new SoCs.
- Strong debugging skills on real hardware using JTAG debuggers, logs, and register-level analysis.
- Broad system-level understanding of how silicon, firmware, SDK, host software, and platform interact, with the ability to turn customer requirements into technical solutions.
This role has been open 3 days — well below the 58-day median for Embedded Firmware Engineering roles.
Embedded Firmware Engineering · Systems Software
|
Open roles in category
717
|
Median days open
58 d
|
Median salary
$169k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, and who else is hiring
| Metric | Astera Labs | All employers we track in this specialty (717 roles · 79 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 5 | 717 |
| Open roles in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family | 13 | 6063 · 146 employers |
| Median days open | 36 d | 58 d (−22 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $169k |
Who's hiring in this category
- Qualcomm · 125 open roles · median 58 d
- Micron Technology · 61 open roles · median 98 d
- AMD · 59 open roles · median 33 d
- NVIDIA · 57 open roles · median 58 d
- Lattice Semiconductor · 40 open roles · median 30 d
- NXP Semiconductors · 29 open roles · median 77 d
How we counted: 717 open Embedded Firmware Engineering (Systems Software) roles from 79 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 8 Oct 2026. Specialty figures count only roles carrying this exact specialty label, so an employer's related work in neighbouring specialties is not included there — it is counted in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family row. Figures refresh nightly.