Senior Physical Design Engineer

Microsoft • Redmond, WA

1d • $119,800 - $261,000

About The Position

Microsoft Silicon, Cloud Hardware, and Infrastructure Engineering (SCHIE) supports Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure and online services. Within SCHIE, the Compute Silicon & Manufacturing Engineering (CSME) organization designs, develops, manufactures, and packages Microsoft computer chips, including Azure Cobalt. The organization works to deliver cloud hardware infrastructure at scale, with a focus on quality, delivery, cost, and sustainability.

The Senior Physical Design Engineer will support silicon design by owning physical-design implementation from RTL through GDS. The role includes end-to-end execution from synthesis through place-and-route and completion of signoff activities, including timing, physical verification, EMIR, formal equivalence, and low-power verification. The engineer will work with cross-functional teams and partners to improve design tools, flows, and methodologies, and communicate project status and plans.

Requirements

• Doctorate in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field and at least 1 year of technical engineering experience; or a master's degree in one of these fields and at least 4 years of technical engineering experience; or a bachelor's degree in one of these fields and at least 5 years of technical engineering experience; or equivalent experience.
• Ability to meet Microsoft, customer, and/or government security screening requirements, including passing the Microsoft Cloud Background Check upon hire or transfer and every two years thereafter.
• Provide proof of citizenship, U.S. permanent residency, or other protected status for export-control eligibility assessment; citizenship will be verified with a valid passport, with other applicable documents accepted for lawful permanent residents, refugees, and asylees.
• Proven physical-design experience implementing designs through synthesis, floorplanning, place-and-route, extraction, timing, and physical verification.
• Experience in low-power design methodology for SoCs.
• Thorough understanding of SoC or subsystem design trade-offs across power, performance, and area (PPA).
• Familiarity with clock-construction strategies for high-speed designs.
• Technical expertise across physical design from synthesis through place-and-route and signoff, including timing, physical verification, EMIR, formal equivalence, and low-power verification.
• Problem-solving and data-analysis skills.
• Ability to communicate effectively with cross-functional teams.

Nice To Haves

• At least 7 years of experience in semiconductor design.
• Bachelor's or master's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related field.
• Communication, collaboration, and teamwork skills, including the ability to contribute to diverse and inclusive teams.
• Production silicon tape-out experience in advanced foundry process nodes.
• Experience owning complete physical-design execution of a medium- to large-size SoC block as a hands-on individual contributor and collaborating across teams.
• Experience partnering with PD flow/CAD and methodology teams to identify and resolve PD TFM issues.

Responsibilities

• Drive end-to-end execution from synthesis through place-and-route for large designs, completing signoff stages including timing, physical verification, EMIR, formal equivalence, and low-power verification.
• Own clock construction and clock-tree synthesis (CTS).
• Drive methodology exploration to optimize SoC blocks for clock construction and related methodology.
• Coordinate with CAD, RTL/design, DFT, architecture, power and performance, technology, and other internal and external partners.
• Implement RTL-to-GDS in the physical-design domain.
• Influence design tools, flows, and methodologies for construction, signoff, and optimization using a data-driven approach.
• Collaborate across teams to deliver solutions aligned with a One Microsoft mindset.
• Demonstrate technical expertise across physical-design domains.
• Communicate project status and planning clearly.
• Demonstrate Microsoft core values, including customer focus, adaptability, collaboration, growth mindset, drive for results, influence for impact, judgment, and diversity and inclusion.

Benefits

• The posting states that certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation, with further information available through the linked Microsoft careers page.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior