The Sr. RF Firmware Engineer will develop advanced RF sensing capabilities for Mach's autonomous defense platforms, focusing on next-generation counter-UAV radar systems and RF seekers. This role involves designing, implementing, verifying, and optimizing embedded firmware that controls the RF front-end across the full development lifecycle, from bare-metal board bring-up to deployment. The engineer will collaborate with cross-functional teams including antenna and RF hardware engineers to ensure the radar RF front-end meets mission-critical requirements, requiring strong technical execution and a hands-on approach in a fast-paced environment.

Responsibilities

Mission: Build next generation counter-UAV defense systems that will be used to defend human lives, critical infrastructure, and high value assets for the United States and its allies.
Firmware development: Write high-performance, bare-metal C/C++ firmware for resource constrained microcontrollers powering the RF front-end boards in Mach’s radar products.
Hardware co-design: Work with hardware engineers on component selection, board bring-up, and optimal hardware-software trade-offs (power, cost, form factor).
Firmware bring-up: Bring-up low level C/C++ bare-meta code from scratch, including peripherals/drivers (I2C, SPI, CAN, GPIO) to configure RF/microwave ICs (such as DDS, PPL, LNA, PA, filters, switches, etc) and interface to other subsystems.
RF performance verification: Devise lab tests using RF/microwave test equipment to verify the functionality of the firmware and performance of the RF front-end boards.
RF calibration: Analyze amplitude, phase, and performance metrics to develop calibration techniques and implement calibration techniques in firmware to optimize the performance of the RF front-end boards.
Automation/Scripting: Write scripts (Python) to automate factory RF/microwave calibration processes to speed up calibration and ensure a high calibration accuracy.
Testing and reliability: Own firmware quality, reliability and performance by proactively identifying, documenting/tracking and fixing issues to maintain high reliability of Mach’s radar systems.
Software validation: Develop functional and lab tests to validate the accuracy and performance of newly implemented embedded software or new features.
Documentation: Author clear software specifications, architectural designs, and testing procedures to support manufacturing scalability.
Project planning: Contribute to project planning, including communicating risks/blockers and manage engineering trade-offs.

Requirements

Education: Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or Software Engineer or a related field.
Experience: 5+ years of experience developing embedded firmware for RF/microwave front-ends, for products such as radar/RF seekers or wireless radio (4G/5G/BLE/Wifi) products.
Languages: Proficiency in bare-metal C/C++ with proven ability to write clean, well-tested, and highly efficient code in memory constrained environments.
MCU bring-up: Demonstrated experience bringing up new microcontrollers and processors from scratch, including MCU clock/PLL configuration, low-level peripheral bring-up (I2C, SPI, CAN, GPIO) on development kits and Mach’s custom hardware.
RF/Microwave knowledge: Deep familiarity with RF/microwave transmitter and receiver architectures and components (DDS, PLL, LNA, PA, mixers, filters, and down-conversion stages) and calibration techniques.
Test equipment: Hands-on experience using lab test equipment (oscilloscopes, spectrum analyzers, signal generators, logic/protocol analyzers) to debug and measure the performance of RF front-end hardware.
Automation/scripting: Proficiency in Python or other scripting language to automate the collection of RF/microwave measurements and calibration data.
Protocols: Deep understanding of standard communication protocols (SPI, I2C, UART, CAN and Ethernet) used to control RF/microwave ICs and interface with other subsystems.
Schematics Reading: Ability to read electronics circuit schematics to isolate hardware/software issues.
Optimization: Skilled in optimizing code to meet strict real-time timing and deterministic software constraints.
Testing: Ability to debug, test and validate embedded software using functional tests, logic/protocol analyzers and lab tests to ensure the functionality of embedded software.
Execution: Strong grasp of full software development life cycle and ability to execute and thrive in a fast-paced, high-iteration environment, delivering frequent software updates with speed and precision.
Location: Ability to work 100% on-site at our headquarters in Huntington Beach, CA.

Nice to have

RF/Microwave Theory: Strong theoretical background in radar, electromagnetic wave propagation, wireless communication or RF sensing and RF calibration techniques.
Compliance: Knowledge of military, aerospace, or safety-critical software standards (e.g., DO-178C, MISRA C, ASIL).

Benefits

The salary range for this role is an estimate based on a wide range of compensation factors, inclusive of base salary only. Actual salary offers may vary based on (but not limited to) work experience, education and training, critical skills, and business considerations. Highly competitive equity grants are included in most offers and are considered part of Mach’s total compensation package. Mach offers benefits such as health insurance, retirement plans, and opportunities for professional development.