Photonic Design Manager - CA, San Jose, United States
Originally posted 1 September 2026 by the employer.
Lead a team of silicon photonics design engineers to deliver product-quality PICs for co-packaged optics.
About the role
The manager will focus on developing best practices for device design, circuit analysis, and DFx, leading the team to deliver product-quality PICs for co-packaged optics.
What you'll do
- Lead and manage a design team to deliver advanced integrated silicon photonic devices
- Closely collaborate with internal and external teams to define and drive foundry technology and supply chain requirements
- Establish and maintain best-practices for DFx across photonic designs
What you'll need
- Experience in integrated photonics with a track record of shipping products
- Prior line management experience
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
- Bachelor, Masters or PhD degree in Physics/Electrical Engineering
Nice to have
- Strong working experience in managing photonic design teams
- Hands-on experience in integrated photonics
- Experience bringing a photonic product from R&D to HVM
- Experience working with industry-standard photonic and electronic design tools (Cadence/Synopsys, Ansys FDTD/MODE, TCAD, HFSS, EMX, COMSOL, and similar tools)
- Photonic design and analysis software development, such as in Python/Matlab or Verilog-A
- Deep expertise in optical communication from device physics to link architecture
- Familiarity with cross-disciplinary skillsets in high-speed design, test systems, optical control, hardware/firmware design, advanced electronic and photonic packaging, reliability, and qualification testing.
Skills: silicon photonics, photonic design, PICs, co-packaged optics, device design, circuit analysis
This role has been open 43 days — well below the 71-day median for Optical/Photonics IC Design roles.
Optical/Photonics IC Design · Photonics
|
Open roles in category
128
|
Median days open
71 d
|
Median salary
$201k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, skills in demand, and who else is hiring
| Metric | AMD | All employers we track in this specialty (128 roles · 31 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 4 | 128 |
| Median days open | 30 d | 71 d (−41 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $201k |
Skills observed across this category: silicon photonics, photonic design, PICs, co-packaged optics, device design, circuit analysis
Who's hiring in this category
- Coherent Corp · 17 open roles · median 84 d
- GlobalFoundries · 15 open roles · median 76 d
- Lightmatter · 11 open roles · median 91 d
- Lumentum · 9 open roles · median 71 d
- Marvell Technology · 8 open roles · median 100 d
- Intel Corporation · 7 open roles · median 54 d
How we counted: 128 open Optical/Photonics IC Design (Photonics) roles from 31 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 14 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. Figures refresh nightly.