Principal System Lead – AI Systems and Frameworks
$211,900 - $317,900 USD yearly
Originally posted 9 April 2026 by the employer. Relisted by the employer on 24 September 2026.
About the role
As a Principal System Lead in the Mobile Product System and Architecture organization, you will translate emerging AI-driven use cases into system implementations using Qualcomm mobile SoCs and software platforms. The role emphasizes system architectures across generative AI, diffusion models, and camera-centric AI workloads.
What you'll do
- Analyze emerging OEM use cases involving generative AI, diffusion models, on-device inference, camera-centric AI, and always-on AI workloads, mapping them to hardware and software capabilities. - Define and propose system-level architectural enhancements across AI accelerators, CPUs, GPUs, memory subsystems, and power management. - Evaluate trade-offs across performance, power, memory bandwidth, model size, latency, and thermal constraints in OEM deployment scenarios. - Analyze AI software stacks and frameworks—including Android AI frameworks, open-source ML runtimes, and third-party SDKs—and their interaction with underlying hardware architecture. - Collaborate with hardware, software, systems, and AI platform teams to ensure architectural decisions align with product roadmaps and customer feedback. - Identify architectural bottlenecks across hardware and software boundaries to optimize performance, energy efficiency, and low-power modes of operation.
What you'll need
- Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or related field with 8+ years of engineering experience (or Master's degree with 7+ years, or PhD with 6+ years). - 8+ years of experience in semiconductor product development. - 5+ years of experience in a technical leadership role.
Nice to have
- Master's Degree or Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field. - 8–10 years of experience in semiconductor product development domains including system design, architecture, hardware design, and validation. - 3+ years of experience making trade-offs between product key performance indicators (KPIs) and costs. - 5+ years of experience working within a matrixed organization. - 3+ years of experience directly interacting with senior leadership.
Skills: generative AI, diffusion models, on-device inference, AI accelerators, AI software stacks
This role has been open 198 days — well above the 87-day median for AI/ML Hardware Engineering roles.
AI/ML Hardware Engineering · AI ML Hardware
|
Open roles in category
506
|
Median days open
87 d
|
Median salary
$236k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, skills in demand, and who else is hiring
| Metric | Qualcomm | All employers we track in this specialty (506 roles · 77 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 104 | 506 |
| Open roles in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family | 735 | 6250 · 144 employers |
| Median days open | 116 d | 87 d (+29 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $236k |
Skills observed across this category: generative AI, diffusion models, on-device inference, AI accelerators, AI software stacks
Who's hiring in this category
- Qualcomm (this employer) · 105 open roles · median 116 d
- NVIDIA · 89 open roles · median 58 d
- AMD · 33 open roles · median 107 d
- Micron Technology · 26 open roles · median 59 d
- Mobileye · 20 open roles · median 85 d
- Analog Devices · 18 open roles · median 43 d
How we counted: 506 open AI/ML Hardware Engineering (AI ML Hardware) roles from 77 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 25 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.