Senior Power and Performance Validation Engineer

Graphcore•Austin, TX

17h

About The Position

Graphcore is a world leader in AI compute, developing hardware, software, and systems infrastructure to drive AI breakthroughs and adoption across industries. As part of SoftBank Group, Graphcore is committed to enabling Artificial Super Intelligence and making its benefits accessible to all. The company fosters a culture of continuous learning and innovation, with diverse teams of AI research specialists, silicon designers, software engineers, and systems architects. The Power and Performance Validation team, within Architecture and Validation, is responsible for validating the performance, efficiency, and thermal behavior of Graphcore's AI compute silicon and systems. This team supports the entire product lifecycle, from early architectural modeling to production readiness. Engineers collaborate globally to debug issues, optimize workloads, and enhance validation infrastructure and methodologies.

Requirements

Strong experience in power and performance validation, silicon characterization or system performance engineering
Deep understanding of modern SoC architecture, including CPU, memory, interconnect and high-speed I/O technologies
Strong Linux systems knowledge and low-level performance analysis experience
Strong Python programming skills for automation, orchestration and data analysis
Experience with benchmarking and profiling tools such as stress-ng, fio, perf, iperf or equivalent technologies
Experience debugging complex hardware and software interactions
Ability to define structured validation methodologies, workload models and test strategies
Strong analytical skills with the ability to interpret large datasets and identify system bottlenecks
Strong communication and cross-functional collaboration skills
Ability to work independently on complex technical tasks while collaborating effectively across teams

Nice To Haves

Experience with AI accelerator, GPU or high-performance compute architectures
Experience with pre-silicon modelling or simulation environments
Knowledge of power management technologies and silicon characterization methodologies
Programming experience in C/C++ for low-level system or benchmark development
Familiarity with hardware instrumentation and telemetry systems
Experience working with high core-count or large-scale compute systems
Experience contributing to shared validation infrastructure and engineering best practices

Responsibilities

Define validation strategies for power, thermal and performance characterization of AI compute silicon and platforms
Contribute to planning and execution of validation activities across multiple projects and milestones
Develop comprehensive validation plans covering functional, stress, workload and corner-case scenarios
Lead post-silicon bring-up and characterization activities for power and performance validation
Drive validation of CPU, memory, interconnect and high-speed I/O subsystems under complex workload conditions
Develop scalable automation frameworks, regression infrastructure and reporting tools using Python
Design and execute benchmark workloads, parameter sweeps and performance experiments to identify optimization opportunities
Collaborate with architecture, RTL, firmware, software and systems teams to debug and resolve complex technical issues
Define validation metrics, pass/fail criteria and reporting methodologies to ensure repeatable and high-quality analysis
Guide development of custom workload generators and micro-benchmarks where required
Analyse power, thermal and performance data to identify bottlenecks and recommend improvements
Contribute to continuous improvement of validation processes, tooling and engineering practices
Communicate technical findings, project status, risks and recommendations clearly to stakeholders and engineering leadership
Support knowledge sharing and contribute to continuous improvement across the validation organisation