Prototyping Design Software Engineer

Prototyping Design Engineer

Snap Inc is a technology company. We believe the camera presents the greatest opportunity to improve the way people live and communicate. Snap contributes to human progress by empowering people to express themselves, live in the moment, learn about the world, and have fun together. The Company's three core products are Snapchat, a visual messaging app that enhances your relationships with friends, family, and the world;
Lens Studio, an augmented reality platform that powers AR across Snapchat and other services; and its AR glasses, Spectacles.

Specs Inc. is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Snap Inc. dedicated to making computing more human. The company develops Specs, advanced eyewear that seamlessly integrates digital experiences into the physical world.

Specs feature see-through lenses that place digital objects directly into three-dimensional space, powered by Snap OS, a proprietary, context-aware operating system designed for natural interaction with your hands and voice.

Specs Inc. also provides Lens Studio, a full suite of advanced developer tools that powers immersive augmented reality experiences across Specs, Snapchat, and other services.

We are looking for a Prototyping Design Engineer with strong SoC prototyping experience and enough embedded software skills to help bring platforms to life early. You will port complex SoC RTL onto FPGA, HAPS, and ZeBu platforms, enable boot and software validation flows, and collaborate across RTL, verification, system software, and infrastructure teams. This role is ideal for someone who can move between hardware integration, platform bring-up, low-level software debug, and RTOS/bare-metal enablement.

What you'll do:

• Port SoC and subsystem RTL onto FPGA, HAPS, and ZeBu platforms while keeping the prototyping code as close as possible to ASIC RTL and carefully managing target-specific conditionals.
• Build and maintain pre-silicon platforms that enable early firmware software development, boot loader/FSBL bring-up, and validation of key interfaces such as eMMC, LPDDR, PCIe, MIPI CSI2/DSI, UART, QSPI Flash, SPI, I2C/I3C, GPIO, and JTAG.
• Rework RTL, wrappers, and platform-specific logic for prototyping targets, including HAPS/ZeBu-specific interface PHY changes and controller-presence handling to support common software flows across SoC, ZeBu, HAPS, and FPGA platforms.
• Develop, integrate, or adapt low-level embedded software needed for bring-up, including board support code, boot configuration, device drivers, diagnostics, and RTOS or bare-metal test applications.
• Debug complex hardware/software bring-up issues across HAPS, ZeBu, and FPGA targets, including memory-model integration, reset and clock sequencing, controller/PHY interaction, timing issues, waveform analysis, JTAG/SWD debug, and timing-report review.
• Participate in designing, developing, and maintaining SoC validation tests at pre-tapeout stages using firmware, bare-metal tests, RTOS-based applications, and host automation.
• Partner with SoC, verification, infrastructure, and external vendors to root-cause issues and accelerate pre-silicon software readiness.
• Integrate prototyping platforms into CI/CD flows and improve build reliability, automated regressions, artifact traceability, and shared platform infrastructure.

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities:

• Strong understanding of SoC RTL integration and the tradeoffs required to map large designs onto prototyping and emulation platforms.
• Hands-on experience with FPGA prototyping and hardware emulation platforms such as HAPS, ZeBu, or similar Cadence/Siemens/Synopsys environments.
• Experience with Static timing analysis for XILINX/Intel FPGA platforms
• Proficiency in embedded C/C++ and ability to read, write, and debug low-level firmware for boot, diagnostics, drivers, and hardware validation.
• Experience with RTOS concepts and development, including task/thread scheduling, interrupts, synchronization, timers, memory management, device-driver integration, and real-time constraints.
• Experience with bare-metal development and boot flows, including boot ROM/FSBL, startup code, linker scripts, memory maps, MMU/MPU/cache configuration, and board support packages.
• Familiarity with ARM Cortex-M/R/A architectures, SoC peripherals, and system interfaces such as LPDDR/DFI, eMMC, PCIe, JTAG/SWD, UART, SPI, I2C/I3C, GPIO, and QSPI Flash.
• Experience debugging clocks, resets, timing issues, waveforms, platform bring-up problems, and embedded software crashes or asserts across multiple pre-silicon targets.
• Familiarity with debugging tools such as JTAG/SWD, GDB, trace, logic analyzers, waveform viewers, embedded logging, and diagnostic frameworks.
• Ability to work from RTL, hardware schematics, datasheets, and timing reports, and to communicate platform limitations and integration constraints clearly across hardware and software teams.
• Strong problem-solving, communication, teamwork, and prioritization skills in a fast-paced cross-functional environment.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Master's…