SoC Engineer

About the Team

OpenAI’s Hardware organization develops custom silicon and systems for advanced AI workloads. Our first-party accelerator team works across chip architecture, design, software, and systems to build the computing platforms that power frontier models. We are a small, dynamic team that values technical breadth, hands-on engineering, and creative approaches to building complex hardware.

About the Role

We’re looking for a SoC Engineer to help architect, design, and integrate OpenAI’s first-party AI accelerators. You will build the processor, interconnect, I/O, and platform infrastructure that connects our accelerator designs into complete, functional systems.

This role combines architectural judgment with hands-on implementation. You’ll work closely with design, architecture, verification, and software teams throughout development, from defining subsystem requirements and integrating IP to pre-silicon validation, silicon bring-up, and post-silicon debug. You should enjoy stretching across domains, rolling up your sleeves, and doing the work needed to make a complex system function end to end.

In this role, you will:

• Define and implement SoC architectures spanning embedded processors, AMBA interconnects, peripheral subsystems, PCI Express, Ethernet and die-to-die interfaces.

• Develop the microarchitecture and RTL design of subsystems supporting I/O and SoC functionality.

• Integrate Arm Cortex-M and Cortex-A processors, AXI/APB fabrics, and third-party controller IP, including the RTL and glue logic needed to connect these components.

• Develop reset and boot architectures, working with firmware and software teams to define sequencing, initialization, and survivability behavior.

• Incorporate debug, test, and security requirements into the SoC architecture and implementation, partnering with other silicon designers to make the silicon observable, testable, and secure.

• Drive PCIe and other I/O integration, including controller and PHY interfaces, high-speed SerDes, and die-to-die connectivity.

• Contribute to power management and security architecture and design.

• Work directly with third-party IP vendors to define technical requirements, evaluate IP capabilities, coordinate deliverables, and resolve issues from integration through silicon bring-up.

• Work across architecture, design, verification, physical design, and software teams to define interfaces, resolve integration issues, and carry designs through pre-silicon validation and post-silicon bring-up.

• Work closely with Firmware and Software teams to define boot, configuration and runtime behavior and functionality.

• Build and apply automation and AI-assisted tools to accelerate design, IP integration, consistency checking, and debugging while maintaining engineering quality.

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Have experience in SoC architecture, RTL design, and subsystem or full-chip integration, with hands-on ownership through implementation and silicon bring-up.

• Are familiar with Arm processor subsystems, including Cortex-M and Cortex-A, and AMBA protocols and interconnects such as AXI and APB.

• Understand PCIe protocols and have experience configuring, integrating, and debugging controller IP.

• Have experience integrating high-speed I/O, including SerDes/PHY interfaces and die-to-die links.

• Have experience working directly with third-party IP vendors to evaluate technical fit, communicate requirements, and drive integration and debug issues to resolution.

• Understand reset and boot architecture and the interactions between hardware, firmware, and software during initialization and recovery.

• Have experience designing for debug, test, and security, and can reason about how these requirements affect the broader system.

• Are comfortable writing and debugging Verilog/SystemVerilog and building scripts or tools to make integration work more efficient and reliable.

• Enjoy stretching into multiple domains, learning unfamiliar parts of a system, and rolling up your sleeves to build and debug.

• Enjoy working on a small, dynamic team where priorities evolve and engineers take broad ownership.

• Are excited about creatively applying automation and AI tools to hardware design and integration work.

To comply with U.S. export control laws and regulations, candidates for this role may need to meet certain legal status requirements as provided in those laws and regulations.

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity. 

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

For additional information, please see OpenAI’s Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.

Background checks for applicants will be administered in accordance with applicable law, and qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment consistent with those laws, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act, for US-based candidates. For unincorporated Los Angeles County workers: we reasonably believe that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship with the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of a conditional offer of employment: protect computer hardware entrusted to you from theft, loss or damage; return all computer hardware in your possession (including the data contained therein) upon termination of employment or end of assignment; and maintain the confidentiality of proprietary, confidential, and non-public information. In addition, job duties require access to secure and protected information technology systems and related data security obligations.

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