Senior Staff Engineer – NVMe SSD Firmware Validation
$189,000 USD yearly
Lead end-to-end functional validation and protocol compliance for NVMe SSD host interface firmware supporting V-NAND technology.
Originally posted 11 November 2026 by the employer.
About the role
This role leads end-to-end functional validation, protocol compliance, and failure analysis for host interface firmware in NVMe SSDs. Work centers in the Technology Enabling Development Lab (TED) focusing on host interface firmware for V-NAND enterprise storage applications.
What you'll do
- Lead end-to-end functional validation for NVMe SSDs, defining black-box test methodologies, validation plans, coverage metrics, and release-readiness criteria.
- Ensure protocol compliance to NVM Express and PCI-SIG specifications across NVMe, PCIe, NVMe-MI, and sideband management interfaces.
- Define and execute test coverage for NVMe-MI and sideband testing, including out-of-band management, discovery and enumeration, health monitoring, telemetry, and error handling.
- Lead PCIe validation across link training and initialization, link-state transitions, reset and recovery, power management, and error injection.
- Collaborate with firmware, hardware, silicon, platform, and system validation teams to reproduce failures, perform root-cause analysis, and close corrective actions.
- Analyze customer-reported issues and OEM escalations to identify coverage gaps and convert them into automated regression test suites.
What you'll need
- BS in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related field with 15+ years of experience, or MS with 13+ years, or PhD with 10+ years.
- Hands-on experience in NVMe SSD functional validation, protocol testing, system-level qualification, and device debugging.
- Technical knowledge of NVMe, PCIe, NVMe-MI, and sideband interfaces, with the ability to translate specifications into comprehensive test plans.
- Demonstrated expertise in black-box test design, including protocol corner cases, negative testing, and fault-injection testing.
- Python, Bash, and Linux shell scripting skills for test development, automation, and debug.
- Hands-on experience debugging SSD, firmware, and protocol failures using logs, traces, protocol analyzers, and system diagnostics.
More semiconductor jobs: Samsung Semiconductor jobs · Firmware engineer jobs · San Jose jobs
First seen in our index 0 days ago, well below the 56-day median for Embedded Firmware Engineering roles.
Embedded Firmware Engineering · Systems Software
|
Open roles in category
754
|
Median days since first seen
56 d
|
Category median salary (all employers)
$172k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, and who else is hiring
| Metric | Samsung Semiconductor | All employers we track in this specialty (754 roles · 88 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 3 | 754 |
| Open roles in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family | 17 | 6583 · 158 employers |
| Median days since first seen | 152 d | 56 d (−96 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | n/a | $172k |
Who's hiring in this category
- Qualcomm · 117 open roles · median 65 d
- NVIDIA · 84 open roles · median 50 d
- Micron Technology · 50 open roles · median 79 d
- AMD · 47 open roles · median 37 d
- NXP Semiconductors · 37 open roles · median 34 d
- Analog Devices · 31 open roles · median 31 d
How we counted: 754 open Embedded Firmware Engineering (Systems Software) roles from 88 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 12 Nov 2026. Specialty figures count only roles carrying this exact specialty label, so an employer's related work in neighbouring specialties is not included there, and is counted in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family row. Days are counted from when our index first saw each posting, not from the employer's original posting date.