Senior Engineer, Architecture & Performance Research Engineer for Data Center and Agentic AI CPU

About the role

The Architecture Research Lab focuses on researching next-generation CPU (RISC-V) microarchitecture and performance for emerging computing workloads. We explore new architectural ideas, evaluate their performance potential, and rapidly turn promising concepts into working designs that can be validated on real silicon. Our research is driven by emerging opportunities in data center and agentic AI workloads, where we investigate how CPU architecture can evolve to meet new performance and efficiency requirements. We also explore CPU-memory co-design from the CPU perspective, in alignment with the broader shift toward memory-centric architectures.

Responsibilities

• Analyze emerging workloads, develop and refine performance models, identify architectural opportunities, and turn quantitative insights into new microarchitectural concepts.
• Work closely with RTL design teams to evaluate, refine, and implement promising ideas, taking them from architectural modeling through RTL and silicon validation.
• Collaborate with Staff and Principal Engineers, owning a specific microarchitectural domain from idea proposal through implementation and validation.
• Run architectural simulations and performance models, and analyze results such as IPC, CPI stacks, latency, and throughput.
• Identify performance bottlenecks and optimization opportunities across the front-end, mid-end, and back-end.
• Characterize workloads and benchmarks to understand performance behavior and architectural opportunities.
• Develop scripts and tools to automate and accelerate performance analysis and architectural exploration.
• Contribute to patents and technical publications based on novel architectural research.

Requirements

• Master’s with Computer Architecture, Computer Engineering, or a related field and 3+ years of experience or PhD degree in Computer Architecture, Computer Engineering, or a related field.
• 1+ years of experience in CPU microarchitecture or performance engineering.
• Strong understanding of out-of-order execution, branch prediction, pipelines, speculation, and cache/memory systems.
• Hands-on experience with architectural simulators such as gem5.
• Proficiency in C/C++ and Python.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with RISC-V, ARM, or x86 CPU cores, or with GPU/NPU vector unit design.
• Experience with or interest in AI-driven or agentic design workflows.
• Understanding of execution patterns and characteristics of agentic AI workloads.
• Domain-specific experience in the front-end, mid-end, or back-end areas described above.
• Experience with PPA trade-off analysis.
• Experience with CPU tape-out or silicon validation.
• Experience with patents or technical publications related to CPU.

Qualifications

• Inclusive, adapting your style to the situation and diverse global norms of our people.
• Approach challenges with curiosity and resilience, seeking data to help build understanding.
• Collaborative, building relationships, humbly offering support and openly welcoming approaches.
• Innovative and creative, proactively exploring new ideas and adapting quickly to change.

Benefits

• Pay range: $138,000—$206,000 USD
• Incentive opportunities based on individual and company performance.
• Diverse package of benefits centered around the wellbeing of our employees and their loved ones.
• Charitable giving match and frequent opportunities to get involved.
• 4+ weeks of paid time off a year, plus holidays and sick leave.
• Stipend for fertility care or adoption, medical travel support, and virtual vet care for your fur babies.
• On-demand apps and free confidential therapy sessions.
• Eat well and be active with onsite Café and gym, plus virtual classes.
• Flexibility benefits to find the right balance for you.