Firmware Engineer

Mind Robotics • Palo Alto, CA

2d

About The Position

At Mind Robotics, we're building generalized physical AI — robotic systems capable of dexterous, adaptive, and reasoning-intensive work in real-world industrial environments. Firmware is the connective tissue between intelligence and action; the layer where commands become motion. We're looking for a Firmware Engineer to own the embedded software that brings our robots to life — from low-level motor control and real-time scheduling to the communication buses that tie the whole system together.

Requirements

• Technical degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or equivalent
• Demonstrated experience (through work, research, or projects) building firmware for real physical systems — robots, motors, power electronics, or similar
• Deep fluency in C/C++ and/or Rust for embedded targets; comfort reading datasheets and writing drivers
• Hands-on experience with RTOS environments (FreeRTOS, Zephyr, or similar) — task scheduling, priority management, and real-time guarantees
• Strong working knowledge of embedded communication protocols: CAN, EtherCAT, I2C, SPI, UART
• Direct experience configuring microcontroller peripherals (GPIO, ADC, PWM, timers, DMA) and understanding their impact on system timing and performance
• Experience integrating sensors and actuators at the firmware level — not just using libraries, but understanding the hardware underneath
• Proven ability to debug across the hardware/software boundary with oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and JTAG
• Comfortable with ambiguity, move fast, and have an "engineering curiosity" that drives you to understand how the entire system works, not just your part

Nice To Haves

• Experience with safety-critical or deterministic real-time systems (IEC 61508, ISO 26262, or similar)
• Familiarity with field-oriented control (FOC) or other motor control algorithms
• Experience with Linux-based embedded systems and the boundary between RTOS and application layers
• Python scripting for test automation, data logging, or hardware validation

Responsibilities

• Write, test, and maintain production-quality firmware in C/C++ or Rust for microcontrollers and embedded processors across the robot
• Implement and debug embedded communication protocols — CAN, EtherCAT, I2C, SPI, UART — across distributed hardware nodes
• Configure and manage microcontroller peripherals — GPIO, ADC, PWM, timers, and DMA — to interface with sensors, actuators, and power electronics
• Integrate sensors (encoders, IMUs, torque sensors, force/torque arrays) into the robot's real-time pipeline
• Work closely with electrical engineers on board bring-up, pinout definitions, and hardware-software interface design
• Develop and tune real-time control loops for motors, actuators, and other physical systems under hard timing constraints
• Build tooling to support firmware validation, regression testing, and hardware-in-the-loop systems
• Triage and debug complex interactions between firmware, hardware, and higher-level software during development and field deployment

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Education Level: Associate degree