Senior FPGA Design Engineer

Job Title

Senior FPGA Design Engineer

Role Summary

Lead and primary contributor for FPGA signal-processing design and implementation for radio-frequency and optical/thermal imaging systems. Work on end-to-end FPGA DSP systems including architecture, RTL, verification, implementation, and government-facing technical reporting.

Experience Level

Senior — minimum 5 years FPGA development experience; 10+ years preferred.

Responsibilities

Primary technical responsibilities and team leadership tasks.

• Design and implement FPGA-based digital signal processing systems for RF and imaging applications.
• Develop self-checking unit and system-level testbenches and run simulations.
• Troubleshoot and resolve design, timing, and integration issues across FPGA, SoC, and peripherals.
• Integrate IP cores and interfaces (DDR, video, Ethernet, SFP+, USB3, etc.).
• Prepare detailed design documentation and technical reports for government customers.
• Plan and manage work independently, conduct code reviews, and communicate status to stakeholders.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and constraints.

• Strong RTL design, simulation, and implementation experience — VHDL primary, Verilog secondary.
• Mastery of FPGA toolflows (Vitis/Vivado, Quartus Prime, Radiant, Libero) including synthesis, P&R, and TCL scripting.
• Recent Xilinx experience with UltraScale+, Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC, and Versal devices; experience with development boards and FMC modules preferred.
• Experience integrating FPGA IP with DDR memory and high-speed interfaces (HDMI/DisplayPort, xGigE, SFP+, USB3).
• Experience with Linux (including embedded) and Xilinx SoC hardware/software co-design with embedded multicore processors.
• Familiarity with digital-electronics hardware design and lab equipment; comfortable reading/creating hardware documentation.
• Excellent verbal and written communication for technical teams and customers.
• Minimum 5 years' FPGA development experience (10+ desired).
• U.S. citizenship and ability to obtain a Department of Defense security clearance (required).

Nice-to-have / preferred:

• SIGINT, EW, communications, radar, lidar, or image-processing experience.
• PicoBlaze, MicroBlaze, ARM Cortex-A9, Yocto or RTOS bring-up on FPGA SoCs.
• Experience with PCB/hardware design, OpenVPX, VITA49, and digital receivers/transmitters.
• MATLAB/Simulink/Python modeling, C/C++ embedded programming, and scripting (Tcl, Python, Perl, Ruby).
• Familiarity with Git/Subversion, lab equipment (oscilloscopes, spectrum analyzers), and CMMC/cloud development practices.
• Recent use of LLMs or automation agents in design workflows (desired).

Education Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or ECE is required; Master's degree preferred. Preference given to applicants with relevant prior experience.

About the Company

Company: Perceptive Innovations

Headquarters: Dulles, VA, United States

Perceptive Innovations is a U.S.-based engineering startup specializing in FPGA-based digital signal processing for radio-frequency and optical/thermal imaging systems, delivering defense and government-focused sensor and imaging solutions. Roles often require U.S. citizenship and the ability to obtain DoD security clearances.