Senior Linux Kernel Driver Engineer

Job Title

Senior Linux Kernel Driver Engineer

Role Summary

Develop and maintain the Linux kernel driver for Fractile's PCIe-attached AI accelerator, working at the boundary between host and silicon to deliver low-latency, high-throughput inference.

Owner of kernel-space performance paths and the userspace interface used by the runtime; participate in pre-silicon simulation, hardware bring-up, and cross-functional co-design with hardware, firmware, runtime and ML teams.

Experience Level

Senior — 3+ years of industry experience (as specified in the posting).

Responsibilities

Primary responsibilities include implementing and optimising kernel interfaces that affect device throughput and latency, and ensuring robust operation on server platforms.

• Design, develop, and maintain the Linux kernel driver for Fractile’s AI accelerator.
• Implement performance-critical kernel-space paths: PCIe device management, DMA, memory handling, interrupts, and recovery paths.
• Define and maintain the userspace interface used by the runtime with a focus on stability, debuggability, and performance.
• Work in a tight co-design loop with hardware, firmware, runtime and ML engineers: validate assumptions and iterate on behaviour.
• Improve tooling and workflows for safe, fast iteration (profiling/tracing/benchmarks and regression tracking).
• Participate in pre-silicon simulation, first bring-up, and first end-to-end runs to close performance and correctness gaps.
• Comply with export-control eligibility checks when required by applicable law.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and experience.

• Proven track record of shipping and maintaining Linux kernel device drivers in production.
• Experience with PCIe-attached devices and custom hardware interfaces.
• Strong systems and performance instincts; ability to reason about architecture, concurrency, and performance hotspots.
• Proficient in C and/or Rust with a pragmatic approach to maintainable, secure kernel code.
• Enjoys solving hard kernel and system-level problems and driving them end-to-end until measurable improvements are achieved.

Nice-to-have:

• Experience with GPUs, ML accelerators, or high-throughput I/O (NICs, RDMA, storage).
• Hardware bring-up or pre-silicon simulation experience.
• Performance tooling experience: profiling, tracing, benchmarking, and regression tracking.

Education Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Electronic Engineering, Mathematics, Physics, or a related field, plus 3+ years of industry experience as stated in the posting.

About the Company

Company: Fractile

Headquarters: London, UK

Fractile is on a mission to revolutionize AI by developing silicon, systems, and software that enable the fastest execution of advanced models at lower costs. Established in 2022, the company has rapidly expanded, fostering a collaborative culture in its London and Bristol offices. With a focus on innovation in ML/AI IC product development, Fractile combines hardware and software to deliver high-impact solutions for data center applications.