Physical Design Engineer - Sunnyvale, CA, United States
$230,000 - $280,000 USD yearly
Originally posted 10 June 2026 by the employer.
About the role
This role focuses on physical design, driving power, performance, and area strategy in collaboration with the RTL team.
What you'll do
- Own all disciplines of physical design and implementation from RTL to tapeout.
- Ensure blocks integrate seamlessly into the full-chip architecture.
- Resolve block and full-chip DRC and LVS issues.
- Perform IR/EM analysis and resolution.
- Optimize for power, performance, and area.
- Work with RTL teams to optimize for physical design.
What you'll need
- 7+ years of physical design and physical verification experience.
- Strong knowledge of block level and full-chip physical verification methodology.
- Strong experience in block/subsystem timing closure.
- Expertise with the complete physical design flow.
- Expertise with ICV or Calibre tools.
- Strong background in STA, constraint drafting, and timing convergence at block, partition, and full-chip.
- Good understanding of full chip floor planning and integration.
- Strong ability in scripting languages like Tcl and Python.
- Skills in Design Compiler, Fusion Compiler, ICC2, or similar physical design tools.
- BS or MS in Electrical Engineering.
Nice to have
- Knowledge of high speed CPU/GPU design.
- Experience with high-speed IO design and 3rd party IP integration.
- Experience with Block/partition PD, PDV, IR.
- Knowledge of Synopsys tool suite.
Skills: 3D integrated products, physical design flow, DRC, LVS, IR/EM
This role has been open 84 days — well above the 61-day median for Physical Design roles.
Physical Design · Physical Design
|
Open roles in category
659
|
Median days open
61 d
|
Median salary
$187k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, skills in demand, and who else is hiring
| Metric | Cerebras | All employers we track in this specialty (659 roles · 80 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 1 | 659 |
| Open roles in the wider Physical Implementation family | 1 | 1441 · 110 employers |
| Median days open | 84 d | 61 d (+23 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $187k |
Skills observed across this category: 3D integrated products, physical design flow, DRC, LVS, IR/EM
Who's hiring in this category
- Qualcomm · 119 open roles · median 46 d
- AMD · 63 open roles · median 25 d
- Intel Corporation · 37 open roles · median 12 d
- Synopsys · 37 open roles · median 33 d
- NVIDIA · 36 open roles · median 71 d
- Broadcom · 30 open roles · median 98 d
How we counted: 659 open Physical Design (Physical Design) roles from 80 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 19 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 Physical Implementation family row. Figures refresh nightly.