Principal FPGA Emulation Engineer

Job Title

Principal FPGA Emulation Engineer

Role Summary

Design and deliver FPGA-based emulation and prototyping platforms to validate mixed-signal power ASICs before silicon. Work closely with silicon RTL and DSP architects to ensure functional equivalence, real-time performance, and to enable firmware/software co-development.

Experience Level

Senior - 10+ years of FPGA design and implementation experience, particularly in ASIC/SoC prototyping or emulation.

Responsibilities

Primary duties include mapping ASIC RTL to FPGA, building real-time emulation environments, and providing pre-silicon debug and tooling.

• Collaborate with RTL and DSP architects to implement ASIC designs on FPGA and preserve architectural intent.
• Adapt ASIC RTL for FPGA emulation (clock-gating, multi-clock handling, memory mapping, analog block modeling).
• Optimize FPGA resource usage (DSP slices, block RAM) and clocking to meet emulation speed targets.
• Build hardware-in-the-loop real-time environments and interface with analog/power stages.
• Develop pre-silicon debug capabilities: logic analysis, waveform capture, and lab instrumentation.
• Automate flows and improve emulation methodologies using TCL and Python.
• Provide technical leadership: mentor engineers, lead reviews, and influence cross-team tooling decisions.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills; useful additional experience listed as nice-to-have.

• Extensive FPGA design and implementation experience in ASIC/SoC prototyping or emulation (10+ years preferred).
• Strong RTL skills in SystemVerilog and/or VHDL with ASIC-style RTL experience.
• In-depth knowledge of FPGA implementation flows: synthesis, place-and-route, and timing analysis on Xilinx or Intel devices.
• Hands-on hardware bring-up and debugging, including in-system logic analysis and lab instrumentation.
• Proficiency in scripting and automation using TCL and/or Python.
• Demonstrated technical leadership and ability to drive cross-team decisions.

Nice-to-have:

• Experience with Synopsys HAPS, Cadence Protium, or similar commercial prototyping platforms.
• Model-based design experience (Simulink, Xilinx System Generator), high-speed interfaces (JESD204B, PCIe), ASIC tape-out and DFT exposure.
• Experience architecting custom FPGA prototyping platforms (PCB design, signal integrity) and embedded/firmware co-development.

Education Requirements

Bachelor's (BS) or Master's (MS) in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related field as stated in the posting.

About the Company

Company: Renesas

Headquarters: Hitachinaka, Japan

Renesas is a global leader in embedded semiconductor solutions, providing high-quality products across automotive, industrial, infrastructure, and IoT sectors. With over 22,000 employees in more than 30 countries, the company focuses on scalable solutions that enhance user experience and drive innovation while committed to sustainability and energy efficiency.