Staff Hardware Design Engineer, SoC/SIP - San Diego, California, United States of America
$134,800 - $202,200 USD yearly
Originally posted 28 July 2026 by the employer.
This role focuses on designing and developing motherboards, add-in cards, and modules for Qualcomm's new AI System On Chip (SoC)/System In Package (SIP).
About the role
This role involves designing and developing motherboards, add-in cards, and modules for Qualcomm's new AI System On Chip (SoC)/System In Package (SIP). It supports rack-level design and integration of cards, servers, and networking switches.
What you'll do
- Lead schematics design, PCB layouts, and design reviews, including component selections.
- Co-develop functional specifications for systems, cards, sub-systems, and rack-level architectures.
- Support architecture and card designs, including accelerator SoCs, memory, I/O, power delivery, and electrical/mechanical integration.
- Participate in the design and development of rack-level inference solutions.
- Assist in the bring-up and debugging of hardware systems, cards, and rack-level configurations.
- Provide technical oversight of factory and manufacturing processes for rack-level deployments.
What you'll need
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Electrical/Electronics Engineering, or related field and 4+ years of Hardware Engineering experience.
- Experience in system/card/rack-level development, including architecture, design, validation, and deployment of enterprise-class hardware platforms.
- Proven experience in rack-level system integration, including chassis, backplane, cabling, airflow, and thermal management.
- Deep knowledge of PCIe cards, motherboards, daughtercards, and backplane signal and power delivery.
- Hands-on experience in dense, high-layer count PCB designs (8–20 layers).
- Knowledge of high-speed serial I/O (6–10 Gbps), PCIe Gen5/6, LPDDR4x/5x, DDR4/5, 200/400/800 GbE.
- Proficiency in schematic capture and PCB layout tools (Cadence Allegro, Mentor Expedition).
- Experience with circuit simulation tools (SPICE) and signal/power integrity analysis.
- Skilled in using lab equipment: oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, JTAG, SMBus, serial debuggers.
Nice to have
- Master's Degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Computer Engineering, or related field.
- 10 years hardware engineering/Systems development experience.
- 4 years of experience with circuit design (e.g., digital, analog, RF).
- 4 years of experience utilizing schematic capture and circuit simulation software.
- 4 years of experience with hardware design and measurement instruments such as oscilloscopes, spectrum analyzers, debug tools.
Skills: rack level design, schematics design, PCB layouts, AI infrastructure, PCIe Gen5/6
This role has been open 81 days — well above the 58-day median for Hardware Systems Engineering roles.
Hardware Systems Engineering · SOC Architecture
|
Open roles in category
103
|
Median days open
58 d
|
Median salary
$208k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, skills in demand, and who else is hiring
| Metric | Qualcomm | All employers we track in this specialty (103 roles · 28 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 21 | 103 |
| Open roles in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family | 705 | 6118 · 145 employers |
| Median days open | 47 d | 58 d (−11 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $208k |
Skills observed across this category: rack level design, schematics design, PCB layouts, AI infrastructure, PCIe Gen5/6
Who's hiring in this category
- AMD · 28 open roles · median 58 d
- Qualcomm (this employer) · 21 open roles · median 46 d
- NVIDIA · 16 open roles · median 77 d
- Intel Corporation · 6 open roles · median 45 d
- Mobileye · 4 open roles · median 25 d
- Apple · 3 open roles · median 17 d
How we counted: 103 open Hardware Systems Engineering (SOC Architecture) roles from 28 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 18 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.