Embedded Software Engineer
About the role
This role focuses on designing, developing, and maintaining embedded software for advanced networking and optical products. You will lead feature development, enhance existing systems, resolve complex issues in legacy products, and collaborate closely with cross-functional engineering teams. The position combines hands-on firmware and software development with mentoring responsibilities and occasional customer-facing technical support, contributing directly to the performance, reliability, and evolution of cutting-edge embedded systems.
Responsibilities
- Design and develop embedded software features based on high-level customer and product line requirements.
- Develop new software and firmware features for existing and future products in the optical networking domain.
- Resolve bugs and sustaining issues in legacy embedded products, ensuring stability and long-term maintainability.
- Collaborate with validation, integration, optical, hardware, and test engineering teams to improve product performance, execution efficiency, and development processes.
- Ensure firmware and related technical documentation are accurate, complete, and kept up to date.
- Apply system product software concepts, including North-Bound Interfaces, board support packages (BSP), photonic control, alarms, and service management functions.
- Participate actively in Agile development practices, including planning, code reviews, continuous integration, and continuous delivery activities.
- Coach and mentor junior software engineers, providing guidance on design, implementation, testing, and coding standards.
- Drive and participate in code reviews to promote best practices, code quality, and consistent design patterns across the team.
- Engage in pre-sales and post-sales technical interactions with customers, helping to clarify requirements and address technical issues.
- Provide technical guidance and support to Field Application Engineers to ensure successful deployment and operation of products.
- Contribute to product and user documentation by providing clear technical input and review.
- Collaborate effectively with cross-site and global teams, coordinating development activities and sharing knowledge across locations.
Requirements
- University degree in Electrical Engineering or Computer Science, or an equivalent technical discipline.
- 8+ years of experience in embedded software systems (5+ years considered for particularly strong candidates).
- Expert-level proficiency in C and C++ programming for embedded systems.
- Proven experience designing and developing embedded firmware and software features from high-level requirements.
- Hands-on experience resolving bugs and sustaining issues in legacy embedded products.
- Experience with system product software functions such as North-Bound Interfaces, board support packages (BSP), photonic control, alarms, and service management.
- Strong understanding of Linux-based multi-process and multi-threaded software design.
- Solid knowledge of object-oriented design principles applied in embedded and systems programming contexts.
- Familiarity with Agile development methodologies and practices.
- Exposure to CI/CD and DevOps-oriented workflows for embedded or systems software.
- Good communication skills, with the ability to work effectively in cross-site and global teams.
- Ability to collaborate closely with validation, integration, hardware, optical, and test engineering teams.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience in the optical networking industry, particularly with Layer 0/1 equipment.
- Experience working with open-source networking and systems software such as SONiC, FRRouting, and Open vSwitch.
- Familiarity with networking and security protocols.
- Experience with virtualization and container technologies.
- Programming experience in Go and Python in addition to C and C++.
- Familiarity with Netconf and related network configuration and management technologies.
- Experience in telecommunications or data networking environments.
- Experience contributing to or integrating open-source software in commercial products.
- Experience collaborating with global, cross-cultural teams; ability to work effectively across time zones.
- Chinese language skills are a plus but not required.
Work Environment
The role operates in a hybrid work environment, with an expectation of 2–3 days per week on-site and flexibility based on business needs. You will work with modern embedded development toolchains on Linux-based systems, collaborating closely with optical, hardware, validation, integration, and test engineering teams. The environment follows Agile development practices and leverages CI/CD and DevOps approaches to streamline delivery. Work is primarily office-based when on-site, in a professional engineering setting focused on collaboration, code quality, and continuous improvement.
Job Type & Location
This is a permanent position based out of Horsham, PA.
Pay and Benefits
The pay range for this position is $120,000 – $165,000 per year. Individual compensation offered within this range will depend on many factors, including qualifications, skills, relevant experience, job knowledge, geographic location, internal equity, and other pertinent job-related factors.
- Paid time off (PTO) and holidays
- Sign-on bonus
- Performance bonus
- 401K plan