Senior Physical Design Engineer, Annapurna Labs

Job Title

Senior Physical Design Engineer, Annapurna Labs (Amazon Web Services)

Role Summary

Design and optimize ASIC physical implementation for AWS custom SoCs used in machine learning servers (for example, Inferentia and Trainium). Member of the Cloud-Scale Machine Learning Acceleration team responsible for physical design closure, sign-off, and delivery at datacenter scale.

Experience Level

Senior — the role expects an experienced engineer. The posting indicates typical experience in the senior range (approximately 6+ to 8+ years of relevant ASIC physical design experience depending on degree).

Responsibilities

Primary responsibilities include:

• Collaborate with RTL and architecture teams to evaluate feasibility and power/performance/area trade-offs.
• Drive physical implementation from synthesis through GDSII: floorplanning, place-and-route, power and clock distribution, timing closure, IR drop analysis, and sign-off.
• Perform congestion analysis, bus/pin planning, equivalency verification, physical verification, ECOs, and sign-off activities.
• Develop and maintain physical design methodologies and automation flows.
• Evaluate, specify, and integrate third-party IP; define IP physical requirements.
• Work collaboratively across teams and mentor junior engineers.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and experience:

• 6+ years of ASIC physical-design experience (RTL-to-GDSII), block-level implementation and sign-off.
• Proven experience with physical-design EDA tools (Cadence, Mentor, Synopsys, or equivalent) for synthesis, place-and-route, extraction, and verification.
• Strong skills in timing closure, IR drop analysis, congestion analysis, and power/clock distribution.
• Scripting experience with Python, Perl, Bash, or PowerShell.
• Deep understanding of sign-off activities (timing, IR/EM, physical verification).

Nice-to-have:

• Experience integrating IP and specifying IP requirements in the physical domain (4+ years integrating IP preferred).
• Experience developing CAD flows and automation for synthesis, P&R, and sign-off.
• Knowledge of device physics, custom/semi-custom implementation techniques, and QOR metric analysis.
• Experience with interfaces and technologies such as DDR, PCIe, and fabrics; prior mentoring or leadership experience.

Education Requirements

Employer specifies: Bachelor's degree (BS) in Electrical Engineering or Computer Science with 8+ years' experience, or Master's degree (MS) in EE/CS with 6+ years' experience. No other degrees or certifications are explicitly required in the posting.

About the Company

Company: Amazon Web Services

Headquarters: Seattle, Washington, USA

Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides a comprehensive and evolving cloud computing platform that includes infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and software as a service (SaaS). AWS allows business and developers to use a wide range of cloud services for computing power, storage, and content delivery, among others, thus fostering innovation and enabling faster deployment of applications. AWS is designed to be scalable, flexible, and cost-effective across industries worldwide.