Principal Software Engineer

Job Title

Principal Software Engineer

Role Summary

Lead architecture and implementation of secure, low-level platform software across boot loaders, the Linux kernel, and user-space middleware. Work with the Platform/Systems/Security Engineering team in Noida to define technical direction, ensure security and performance, and mentor senior engineers.

Focus areas include secure boot and measured boot, kernel and middleware security, CI/CD for platform software, and cross-functional delivery for production platforms.

Experience Level

Senior — 10+ years of professional systems or embedded/platform engineering experience.

Responsibilities

Primary responsibilities include designing secure platform components, driving performance and reliability engineering, and enabling a secure software supply chain.

• Design and implement secure boot, measured boot, and chain-of-trust features in boot loaders.
• Design and implement security-related Linux kernel features (device drivers, filesystems, networking, security modules/LSMs).
• Build and optimize user-space middleware (IPC frameworks, OpenSSL, DPDK, userspace drivers).
• Implement and integrate security protocols and hardware-backed key management (TLS 1.3, DTLS, IPsec, SSH, PKI, HSM/TPM).
• Drive threat modeling, secure design reviews, and code audits; apply mitigations such as ASLR, stack canaries, and SELinux/AppArmor policies.
• Lead performance and reliability efforts using profiling and tracing tools (ftrace, eBPF, perf) and memory-safety practices.
• Define CI/CD and secure supply-chain practices for low-level software (artifact signing, SBOMs, reproducible builds, Yocto/Buildroot, Deb/RPM pipelines).
• Mentor and grow engineers, produce architecture/design documents and RFCs, and coordinate with design, IP, DevOps, product, and QA teams.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and demonstrated delivery experience.

• Expert C/C++ for systems-level development; Rust experience is a plus.
• Deep knowledge of Linux kernel internals in at least two areas (drivers, memory management, scheduler, networking, filesystems, LSMs, eBPF).
• Hands-on boot loader development and secure-boot experience (U-Boot, GRUB, measured boot).
• Strong understanding of security protocols and cryptography (TLS/IPsec, X.509/PKI, key exchange, HSM/TPM, secure storage, attestation).
• Experience building user-space middleware and service management (IPC, systemd, observability/logging, configuration frameworks).
• Proficiency with Linux build systems for embedded/platform or enterprise (Yocto/OpenEmbedded, Buildroot, Deb/RPM).
• Proven ownership of architecture/design documents, RFCs, and shipping production-quality platform software.
• Advanced debugging and tracing skills on hardware and virtualized targets (kgdb, crash, perf, ftrace, strace, gdb, BPF tools).

Nice-to-have:

• Trusted execution/firmware (TrustZone, OP-TEE, SGX/TDX), virtualization/containers, high-performance networking/storage (DPDK, SR-IOV, NVMe), safety/security certifications (FIPS, Common Criteria, ISO 27001/21434), secure supply chain practices (artifact signing, SBOM, SLSA), scripting/automation, observability (eBPF tracing), and hardware bring-up/BSP experience.

Education Requirements

Not specified.

About the Company

Company: NXP Semiconductors

Headquarters: Nijmegen, Netherlands

NXP Semiconductors N.V. is a global semiconductor company that provides High Performance Mixed Signal and Standard Product solutions. With over 45,000 employees and operations in more than 35 countries, NXP is a leader in secure connectivity solutions for embedded applications, catering to automotive, industrial IoT, mobile, and communication infrastructure markets. The company is committed to innovation and sustainability, advancing a smarter, safer, and more sustainable world through technology.