Semiconductors, IoT, Microcontrollers, Electronics

Staff Engineer - Applications Software

Austin, TXOnsiteFull TimeStaffPosted 3 days ago

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Required skills

embedded MCU code
embedded systems
real-time environments
power efficiency
consumer electronics
IoT applications
MCU peripherals
SPI
I2C
UART

Nice to have

Zephyr
MIPI
Zigbee
Thread
embedded graphics
display technologies

Role summary

Ambiq is seeking a Staff Applications Software Engineer to join their on-site team in NW Austin. This role focuses on demonstrating the low-power advantages of Ambiq's SoC portfolio by developing power estimation tools, supporting power characterization, and optimizing SoC power efficiency. Responsibilities include developing example applications, device drivers, and Zephyr enablement, debugging software issues, assisting customers, and creating customer-facing documentation. The ideal candidate has extensive experience in embedded development on Cortex-M MCUs, low-power techniques, RTOS, and embedded debugging, with strong problem-solving skills and lab experience.

Company Overview

Ambiq is on a mission to enable intelligence everywhere — powering the AI edge revolution with the world's lowest-power semiconductor solutions.

Built on our proprietary sub- and near-threshold technology, our chips deliver multi-fold improvements in energy efficiency without costly process scaling. Since 2010, we've shipped over 300 million units to customers building smarter wearables, medical devices, IoT products, and AI-powered edge applications.

Our cross-functional teams span design, research, development, production, marketing, sales, and operations across Austin, Hsinchu, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Singapore. We move fast, tackle hard problems, and create space for people to grow through complex, meaningful work that shapes the future of technology.

We're looking for self-motivated, creative problem-solvers who are eager to push technological limits and make a real impact in energy efficiency.

At Ambiq, we live by five values: Innovate. Collaborate. Focus. Learn. Achieve.

If that's you, join us — the intelligence everywhere revolution starts here.

This role will be on-site 5 days a week in NW Austin.

Scope

As the Staff Applications Software Engineer, Power at Ambiq, you will work with Architecture, Design, Validation, Sales, Software Engineering, and field teams to demonstrate the low-power advantages of Ambiq’s SoC portfolio. You will develop examples and tools for power estimation and measurement, support power characterization and profiling for system use cases, and help customers optimize SoC power efficiency. Your work will also include example applications for Ambiq and customer evaluation hardware, device drivers, HAL updates, and Zephyr enablement in the most power-efficient way. You will debug device-level software issues, support field engineers with customer issues, and create customer-facing documentation, including application notes and software design guidelines.

The ideal candidate is a seasoned, hands-on engineer with a strong understanding of embedded development on Cortex-M MCUs, low-power techniques, bare-metal and real-time operating systems, and embedded software debugging. They communicate clearly in writing and in person, learn quickly, thrive in a lab environment, enjoy solving challenging engineering problems, and continually seek to improve products and engineering processes.

Responsibilities

Work closely with product marketing, field engineering, validation, software development, and system test teams to develop power-related example applications, tools, and documentation;

Support power optimization across AmbiqSuite and Zephyr SDK offerings; characterize SoC and system power use cases; and demonstrate our competitive advantage to the market.

Design, debug, port, and analyze embedded microcontroller software drivers, algorithms, application code, board support packages, automated scripts, and test cases to provide the required functionality to end customers.

Collaborate with internal development teams to analyze and debug complex system-level issues and develop software solutions.

Assist customers in using the Ambiq SDKs and hardware platforms.

Collaborate with hardware engineering in the architecture and design of hardware evaluation platforms; provide software for testing and debugging of hardware evaluation platforms.

Develop custom software functions and applications to support microcontroller power and performance analysis and silicon-issue debugging.

Bridge the communication between field and engineering teams for field issues and manage issue status tracking.

Qualifications

MS in ECE or Computer Science with 6+ years of experience, or a BS in ECE/CS with 8+ years of experience.

Required: Experience developing embedded MCU code in C.

Experience with embedded systems in real-time environments.

Experience optimizing power efficiency in consumer electronics and IoT applications.

Experience with Zephyr is a plus.

Experience with at least one MCU IDE from ARM, Keil, IAR, SEGGER, or other.

Familiarity with MCU peripherals including SPI, I2C, UART, ADC, USB, I2S, and PDM. MIPI and USB are a plus.

Experience with Bluetooth and Bluetooth Low Energy.

Experience with short-range technologies including Zigbee and Thread is a plus.

Hands-on lab experience with equipment such as logic analyzers, oscilloscopes, and power measurement equipment.

Familiarity with source code control systems (git) required.

Excellent problem-solving skills for complex system-level HW/SW debug issues.

Experience with embedded graphics and display technologies is a plus.

Scripting experience is required, and Python experience is especially desirable.

Experience leveraging modern AI-assisted software development tools (e.g., Cursor, Codex, or similar) is desirable.

Must be currently authorized to work in the United States for any employer. We do not sponsor or take over sponsorship of employment visas (now or in the future) for this role.

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