Principal Embedded Firmware Engineer

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in California.

📋 Description

• Assume technical leadership for the CR-One firmware platform, overseeing its build, flash, provisioning, release, and update processes.

• Safely enhance and optimize firmware operating on devices within customer and partner settings.

• Manage the OTA release lifecycle, which includes signing, staged deployment, rollback, health validation, and incident management.

• Troubleshoot firmware and hardware issues utilizing logs, telemetry, serial traces, and controlled reproduction methods.

• Enhance reproducibility of builds, documentation for releases, and operational visibility.

• Ensure backward compatibility across different firmware versions, device configurations, and shared wire protocols.

• Assist with factory programming, provisioning, production testing, hardware revisions, and analysis of manufacturing failures.

• Collaborate with backend and dashboard engineers concerning device configuration, telemetry, fleet health, and remote support.

• Contribute to defining the firmware architecture for future generations of CR-One.

• Incrementally improve the system while continuously delivering capabilities for customers and partners.

• Collaborate closely with hardware, backend, product teams, manufacturing, technical services, and external engineering partners.

⛳️ Requirements

• Extensive experience in embedded systems, infrastructure, performance-sensitive software, or other similarly demanding applications.

• Significant hands-on experience with microcontroller firmware.

• Proficiency with RTOS-based systems, including interrupts, peripheral drivers, persistent state management, and resource-constrained devices.

• Ability to initiate and debug hardware directly using datasheets, register maps, and protocol specifications.

• Experience supporting embedded products throughout production and after deployment.

• Knowledge of firmware release safety, OTA updates, device recovery, and field-failure analysis.

• Strong skills in bench debugging.

• Proven track record of taking ownership of a large, evolving codebase and enhancing it while maintaining continuous delivery.

• Sound engineering judgment with the ability to communicate effectively across firmware, hardware, backend, product, and operations teams.

• Preferred: Proficiency in Embedded Rust or Rust on ESP-IDF; experience with ESP32, ESP-IDF, FreeRTOS, or similar embedded platforms; knowledge of LTE-M, NB-IoT, Quectel, u-blox, or other cellular modem integrations; familiarity with MQTT, TLS, mutual TLS, PKI, X.509, and certificate enrollment; understanding of NFC/RFID protocols; experience with USB device stacks, HID, CDC, TinyUSB, BLE, and GNSS; knowledge of secure boot, flash encryption, hardware provisioning, and secure key storage; experience with differential or delta OTA systems; familiarity with binary and JSON serialization formats; experience with Python, Bash, firmware release tools, cross-compilation, and build automation; familiarity with MQTT brokers or fleet management.

• Visa sponsorship is unavailable.

🏝️ Benefits

• Fully remote work option (hybrid model available for those located near Los Alamitos, CA).

• Paid time off of 3+ weeks annually plus holidays.

• 401K plan with employer matching.

• Reimbursements for gym, phone, professional development, and other expenses.

• Comprehensive healthcare coverage, including medical, dental, vision, short-term, and long-term disability insurance.