Senior Lead Post-Silicon validation Engineer - SMMU

Company:

Job Area:

General Summary:

We’re looking for a hands-on validation engineer to own IP- and subsystem-level verification & validation of System MMU (SMMU) blocks within complex SoCs.

You will work across ARM-based architectures, MMU/SMMU translation flows, and the surrounding SoC infrastructure-clocks, resets, NoC/fabrics, coherency, and debug (JTAG) -to ensure functional correctness, performance, and robustness from pre-silicon through post-silicon phases.

Minimum Qualifications:

OR

Master's degree in Science, Engineering, or related field and 2+ years of ASIC design, verification, validation, integration, or related work experience.

OR

PhD in Science, Engineering, or related field and 1+ year of ASIC design, verification, validation, integration, or related work experience.

What You’ll Do (Key Responsibilities)

• Own SMMU validation at block/IP and subsystem levels: coverage-driven test planning, stimulus development, checking/score boarding, and closure.

• Develop test build reusable verification components for SMMU, including page table generators, translation fault injectors, and traffic generators.

• Validate system interactions: SMMU with ARM cores, MMU/TLB, NoC/Interconnect, coherency (ACE/CHI or equivalent), and clock/reset domains (including CDC and low-power/clock-gating scenarios).

• Exercise page table formats and features: stage-1/stage-2 translations, ASIDs/VMIDs, context banks/stream IDs, MSI/IOMMU operations, address translation faults, and SVA/ATS (if applicable).

• Debug complex issues using JTAG and on-chip debug/trace infrastructure (ETM/STM/SWO), bring-up scripts, and logic analyzers; drive root cause with design/architecture teams.

• Performance & stress validation: create stress scenarios (burst/atomic/ordering/ QoS), measure bandwidth/latency, and validate backpressure & throttling behavior through NoC.

• Contribute to emulation/FPGA and post-silicon: port tests, build bare-metal validation, develop board bring-up sequences and lab automation.

• Own quality metrics: functional coverage, code coverage, assertions, defect density/escape rates; author clear test/coverage reports and sign-off criteria.

• Collaborate cross-functionally with architecture, RTL design, firmware/driver, physical design, and validation teams to refine specs and close issues quickly.

• Continuously improve methodology, tools, and checkers; mentor junior engineers in best practices.

Minimum Qualifications (Must-Haves)

• B.E/B.Tech/M.Tech in ECE/EE/CS or equivalent with 3-5 years of relevant experience.

• Strong ARM architecture knowledge (A-profile preferred): memory model, privilege levels, exception model, caches, TLBs, MMU concepts, and virtual memory flows.

• Deep understanding of SMMU/IOMMU fundamentals: stream IDs, context banks, translation stages, page table formats, fault handling, and device DMA interactions.

• Familiar with NoC/interconnect protocols and coherency (e.g., AXI/ACE/CHI), ordering rules, QoS, and interop with SMMU.

• Solid grasp of clocks/resets and their impact on SMMU and NoC behavior; experience validating low-power states and clock gating effects.

• JTAG basics to intermediate: scan chains, boundary scan, run-control, breakpoints, basic scripting with OpenOCD/DS-5/Arm Development Studio or similar.

• Proficient in debugging complex HW/SW issues, using waveforms (e.g., Verdi/DVE), traces, and logs to isolate root cause.

• Scripting in Python/Perl/TCL/Shell for test automation, log parsing, and lab workflows.

• Critical thinking & learning agility: ability to infer failure modes from first principles, design edge-case tests, and quickly onboard new IP/flows.

Preferred Qualifications (Good-to-Have)

• Prior tapeouts with SMMU or IOMMU IP (Arm SMMU v2/v3 or equivalent vendor IP).

• Post-silicon validation experience: lab bring-up, firmware integration, board-level debug.

• Experience with emulation/FPGA prototyping (Veloce, Palladium, Protium, HAPS).

• Familiarity with Linux IOMMU framework, device trees/ACPI, and driver-level validation (DMA mappings, iommu_ops).

• Knowledge of PCIe (including ATS/PRI/PASID), CXL, or virtualization stacks (KVM/Hypervisors) and their interaction with SMMU.

• Exposure to safety/security: memory isolation, SMMU faults as security boundaries, RAS features, error injection and detection.

• Performance modeling/analysis; profiling tools; building synthetic traffic to characterize SMMU/NoC behavior.

• CI/CD for verification (Jenkins/GitLab CI), coverage dashboards, and regression triage at scale.

Tools & Environment

• Languages/Methodology: ARM assembly, C for bare-metal tests, Python/TCL/Perl for scripting.

• Emu/FPGA: Veloce/RUMI

• Versioning/CI: Perforce, Jira.

• OS/Drivers: bare-metal frameworks.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

• Test plan completeness and functional/code coverage closure against SMMU spec and use-cases.

• Defect discovery rate and escape rate (pre- vs. post-silicon).

• Time-to-root-cause for complex issues; quality of triage documentation.

• Regression stability and automation coverage.

• Performance validation completeness vs. targets (latency, bandwidth, QoS).

Example Work Items You’ll Own

• Create tests for stage-1 and stage-2 translations, ASID/VMID rollover, TLB shootdowns, and context switch stress.

• Validate device DMA through SMMU under NoC congestion and clock gating scenarios; confirm ordering and coherency guarantees.

• Run JTAG-based bring-up sequences to verify SMMU registers, enable translations, and capture trace for fault analysis.

• Automate validation: configure IOMMU groups, map/unmap devices, inject faults, and parse kernel logs for health signals.

Education

• B.E/B.Tech or M.E/M.Tech in EE/ECE/CS (or equivalent).

Applicants: Qualcomm is an equal opportunity employer. If you are an individual with a disability and need an accommodation during the application/hiring process, rest assured that Qualcomm is committed to providing an accessible process. You may e-mail [email protected] or call Qualcomm's toll-free number found here. Upon request, Qualcomm will provide reasonable accommodations to support individuals with disabilities to be able participate in the hiring process. Qualcomm is also committed to making our workplace accessible for individuals with disabilities. (Keep in mind that this email address is used to provide reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities. We will not respond here to requests for updates on applications or resume inquiries).

Qualcomm expects its employees to abide by all applicable policies and procedures, including but not limited to security and other requirements regarding protection of Company confidential information and other confidential and/or proprietary information, to the extent those requirements are permissible under applicable law.

To all Staffing and Recruiting Agencies:Our Careers Site is only for individuals seeking a job at Qualcomm. Staffing and recruiting agencies and individuals being represented by an agency are not authorized to use this site or to submit profiles, applications or resumes, and any such submissions will be considered unsolicited. Qualcomm does not accept unsolicited resumes or applications from agencies. Please do not forward resumes to our jobs alias, Qualcomm employees or any other company location. Qualcomm is not responsible for any fees related to unsolicited resumes/applications.

If you would like more information about this role, please contact Qualcomm Careers.