Principal Field Application Engineer

Job Title

Principal Field Application Engineer

Role Summary

Member of the Customer Experience (CX) organization responsible for pre-sales technical engagement with customers on CPU, SoC architecture, security, and software/firmware requirements. Own technical interactions during sales cycles and translate customer needs into SiFive-based solutions.

This is a customer-facing role that partners closely with Sales and internal engineering teams to enable product adoption and delivery.

Experience Level

Senior role. Posting specifies 5+ years of proven industry experience.

Responsibilities

Primary responsibilities include technical ownership of customer-facing activities and supporting the sales process.

• Independently own and drive customer engagements: evaluations, product demos, benchmarks, PPA analysis, FPGA bring-up, and related technical work.
• Take technical ownership of the sales process and work closely with the Sales team to meet targets.
• Understand and interpret customer technical requirements and propose appropriate SiFive-based SoC/CPU solutions.
• Act as the customer’s voice internally and articulate detailed technical requirements to engineering and product teams.
• Support marketing and enablement activities: webinars, application notes, blog posts, and trade-shows as needed.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills, behavioral expectations, and compliance requirements. Nice-to-have items listed separately.

• Must-have: In-depth, working knowledge of CPU microarchitecture and SoC architecture.
• Must-have: Proven track record of successful customer engagements and ability to communicate technical concepts to customers and internal stakeholders.
• Must-have: Self-starter able to work independently and take ownership of technical interactions with customers.
• Must-have: Willingness to travel and be in front of customers ~25% of the time.
• Must-have: Must be authorized to work in China; employment contingent on background checks and any required export-control authorizations or licenses.
• Nice-to-have: Hands-on expertise in either HW development (RTL/implementation flows, verification/validation, backend, FPGA flows) or SW development (C/assembly, OS/RTOS, IDEs, compilers/debuggers).
• Nice-to-have: Experience with CPU IP (ARM, MIPS, or RISC-V) and experience in automotive safety / FuSa methodologies.
• Nice-to-have: Prior customer-facing support or pre-sales experience.

Education Requirements

BS or MS in Electrical Engineering or Computer Science. The posting specifies 5+ years of proven industry experience.

About the Company

Company: SiFive

Headquarters: San Mateo, California, United States

SiFive is a pioneering company in the RISC-V ecosystem, focused on transforming the future of computing by delivering high-performance, data-intensive RISC-V solutions. Their compute platforms empower leading technology firms to innovate across various markets, including AI, machine learning, and automotive sectors. SiFive is recognized for its commitment to ongoing innovation and fostering collaboration among talented teams, impacting lives by enabling advanced chip design.