Senior Principal Embedded Software Architect

Job Title

Senior Principal Embedded Software Architect

Role Summary

Lead and grow an HW/SW co-design system architecture team with a software-first perspective to influence SoC and IP definition from pre-silicon through field deployment. Combine hands-on SoC/IP architectural work, data-backed exploration, and direct people leadership.

This is a hybrid role based in Vancouver, BC. Occasional travel (~10%) is required.

Experience Level

Senior - the role expects a seasoned architect (guidance: 15+ years in system software architecture, firmware development, and HW/SW co-design) with experience managing engineering teams (3+ years preferred).

Responsibilities

Work with multi-discipline engineering teams to ensure hardware choices enable robust, performant, and debuggable software systems; lead the architecture team and represent software needs during product definition.

• Manage, mentor, and direct the HW/SW co-design architecture team; drive roadmaps, milestones, and team performance.
• Serve as the primary technical and operational interface to the Senior Director of HW/SW Co-Design.
• Coordinate cross-functionally with digital, analog, software, validation, and product management to resolve design trade-offs and remove execution bottlenecks.
• Lead HW/SW co-architecture and tradeoff analysis to balance hardware complexity with software efficiency and customer usability.
• Translate customer use cases into quantitative system requirements and co-define hardware accelerators and data paths.
• Define core firmware strategies (bootloaders, initialization, microcode, kernel drivers) across target processing nodes.
• Advocate for hardware debuggability and observability throughout bring-up and field deployment.
• Act as the software-facing customer proxy ensuring APIs and programming models remain intuitive and efficient.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and experience; preferred items listed under "Nice-to-have".

• 15+ years of experience in system software architecture, firmware development, and HW/SW co-design.
• 3+ years of direct engineering management or formal team leadership.
• Expert proficiency in C/C++ for low-level embedded software, bootloaders, and device drivers.
• Experience with RTOS (e.g., Zephyr) and Embedded Linux environments.
• Strong understanding of computer architecture: memory hierarchies, bus/interconnect protocols (AMBA AXI/AHB/APB), and DMA engines.
• Familiarity with RISC-V and ARM architecture fundamentals.
• Hands-on experience with post-silicon bring-up, JTAG debugging, and reading/evaluating RTL (Verilog/SystemVerilog).

Nice-to-have

• Experience with SystemC (TLM 2.0) or transaction-level modeling for architectural exploration.
• Familiarity with pre-silicon simulation platforms (Renode, Virtualizer) and hardware emulation (Palladium, Zebu) or FPGA prototyping.
• Experience with CI/CD and containerized pre-silicon software workflows (Docker).
• Domain knowledge in mixed-signal design, signal-processing accelerators, dynamic power management/DVFS, and hardware security (TrustZone, secure boot).
• Experience defining system-wide debug/trace infrastructure and performance modeling tools.

Education Requirements

Bachelor's or Master's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or Computer Science (BS/MS in EE, CE, or CS) as stated in the posting.

About the Company

Company: Analog Devices

Headquarters: Norwood, Massachusetts, USA

Analog Devices is a leading global semiconductor company that bridges the physical and digital worlds, enabling breakthroughs at the Intelligent Edge. With a focus on innovation, ADI develops solutions that drive advancements in digitized factories, mobility, and digital healthcare. The company employs around 24,000 people globally and reported revenues exceeding $9 billion in FY24, creating technologies that transform lives across various sectors.