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Principal Engineer, Electronic Hardware Design

Ayar Labs
San Jose, CA Full Time
POSTED ON 7/30/2026
AVAILABLE BEFORE 9/30/2026
Principal Engineer, Electronic Hardware Design 
 
Location:  San Jose, CA
 
 
Ayar Labs is shattering AI data bottlenecks by moving data at the speed of light. As pioneers of co-packaged optics (CPO), we are using light instead of electricity to move data faster, further, and with a fraction of the energy needed to fuel the explosive growth of AI models.

Backed by industry giants like NVIDIA, AMD, Mediatek and Intel and manufactured in partnership with the world’s leading semiconductor ecosystem, Ayar Labs’ co-packaged optics solution is key to unleashing next-generation AI scale-up architectures. 

We are seeking a Principal Electronic Hardware Design Engineer to help us revolutionize photonic interconnects for high performance computing. The exceptional candidate will be highly motivated and energetic, willing to take on paradigm-shifting systems design challenges to meet growing scale-up and scale-out bandwidth needs.
 
The Principal Hardware Design Engineer role will take ownership over New Product Introduction (NPI) for External Laser Source (ELS) module hardware design. The candidate must demonstrate excellent capability to execute multi-disciplinary projects, meeting aggressive schedules and technical requirements.
Ayar Labs is a process-driven and collaborative design environment; the successful candidate will be organized and communicative. This role is full-time on-site in our San Jose office.
 

Essential Functions
  • Create and maintain External Laser Source module specifications to meet product requirements
  • Manage communication between cross-functional teams including optical, mechanical and thermal design disciplines
  • Design printed circuit boards schematics for all functions of External Laser Source NPI
  • Manage hardware design resources internal and external to Ayar Labs
  • Develop and execute validation test plans for all laser module hardware design components
 
Required Qualifications
  • Bachelors in Electrical Engineering with 12 years of industry experience, or Masters/PhD in Electrical Engineering with 10 years of industry experience
  • Strong fundamentals in low-noise analog circuit design and electromagnetics
  • Expert knowledge of electro-optic building blocks such as TIA and Laser Driver 
  • Power user of Altium PCB design tools, including Altium 365 and Agile workflows
  • Deep understanding of BMC architecture for enclosure management (OCP)
  • Expert experience using electrical and electro-optic lab equipment such as: Oscilloscope, VNA, ESA, OSA, protocol analyzer, etc..
  • Expert user of circuit simulation tools such as LTspice, PSpice, and vendor-specific switching regulator software
  • Strong programming ability in python, with the ability to automate hardware testing and analysis
  • Strong ability in fundamental embedded programming concepts: real-time operating systems, MCU memory usage, bootloader, serial interfaces
 
Preferred Qualifications
  • Optical transceiver design experience (OSFP, QSFP-DD, CDFP)
  • Firmware development in C (bare-metal / RTOS)
  • Basic RTL development (FPGA, CPLD)
  • Basic Mechanical CAD tool experience (Solidworks, Fusion)
 
Salary range:  $180,000 - $250,000
 
NOTE TO RECRUITERS:
Principals only. We are not accepting resumes from recruiters for this position. Remuneration for recruiting activities is only applicable subject to a signed and executed agreement between the parties. Please don’t send candidates to Ayar Labs, and do not contact our managers.

Ayar Labs is an Equal Opportunity Employer and is strongly committed to all policies which will afford equal opportunity employment to all qualified persons without regard to age, sex, national origin, race, color, ethnicity, creed, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. It is the policy of Ayar Labs to provide reasonable accommodation when requested by a qualified applicant or employee with a disability, unless such accommodation would cause an undue hardship. Veterans are more than welcome and encouraged to apply.

Salary : $180,000 - $250,000

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