Senior Validation Engineer

Job Title

Senior Validation Engineer

Role Summary

Validate and qualify software, firmware, hardware, and system-level features for edge AI accelerator platforms. The role focuses on designing validation strategies, developing automation frameworks, executing functional and performance testing, and ensuring release quality across embedded and AI workloads.

The position works with software, compiler, runtime, hardware, and DevOps teams to triage issues, maintain lab infrastructure, and build automated validation pipelines for nightly, release, and PR-based testing.

Experience Level

Senior — typically requires 5+ years of experience in validation, QA automation, embedded systems, or AI platform testing.

Responsibilities

Primary responsibilities include planning and executing validation activities, building automation, and ensuring system stability and performance across hardware and software layers.

• Design and execute validation plans for AI accelerator platforms, embedded systems, and SDK releases.
• Validate AI/ML workloads (LLMs, VLMs, vision, audio, NLP) across multiple hardware targets.
• Develop and maintain automation frameworks and CI/CD pipelines using Python, Bash, Jenkins/GitHub Actions.
• Perform functional, regression, stress, performance, and scalability testing and benchmarking.
• Validate system-level interfaces such as PCIe, USB, networking, memory, and storage.
• Debug and triage issues across firmware, kernel drivers, runtime, and application layers; analyze logs and crashes.
• Build and maintain automated validation pipelines for nightly, release, and PR-based testing.
• Manage lab infrastructure, devices, and automated execution environments; support customer-specific validation and benchmarking.
• Prepare validation reports, dashboards, and quality metrics to ensure release readiness.
• Validate deployments on x86 and ARM platforms, Linux/containerized/cloud environments.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and experience required for day-one contribution, followed by preferred/nice-to-have items.

• Must-have:
  • Proficient in Python scripting and automation; comfortable with Bash.
  • Strong experience with Linux systems and embedded Linux.
  • Experience with CI/CD tools (Jenkins, GitHub Actions) and building automated pipelines.
  • Familiarity with Docker/containerized environments and Git version control.
  • Experience in functional, regression, stress, and performance testing and automation framework development.
  • Strong debugging, log analysis, and problem-solving skills across HW/SW stack.
• Nice-to-have:
  • Experience with AI/ML model validation (TensorFlow, PyTorch, ONNX) and LLM/VLM workloads.
  • Background in AI accelerator or semiconductor validation and hardware-software integration testing.
  • Experience with performance profiling, benchmarking tools, distributed systems, or large-scale automation.
  • Familiarity with kernel driver validation, PCIe, USB, networking validation, and compiler/runtime validation.

Education Requirements

Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Electronics & Communication, Electrical Engineering, Embedded Systems, or a related technical field; or equivalent practical experience.

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.