Wireless RF PHY Firmware Engineer

Irvine San Diego Until 9/22/2026 10+ years exp First posted July 24, 2026 Last posted July 24, 2026
Job description

Would you like to join Apple’s growing Wireless Connectivity Silicon team? Our wireless System on a Chip (SoC) organization is responsible for all aspects of wireless silicon development with a particular emphasis on highly energy efficient design and new technologies that transform the user experience at the product level, all of which is driven by a world-class vertically integrated engineering team spanning RF/Analog architecture and design, Systems/PHY/MAC architecture and design, VLSI/RTL design and integration, Emulation, Design Verification, Test and Validation, and FW/SW engineering. In this highly visible role, you will be at the center of a silicon design group with a critical impact on getting functional wireless products to hundreds of millions of customers! Responsible for crafting and implementing embedded firmware for SoC bring up and wireless connectivity enablement. You will work closely with product software and manufacturing teams to enable RF and PHY calibrations, algorithms and testing to enable productization of the silicon / system.

Description

As an Embedded FW Engineer, the individual will be a core member of a Wireless SoC firmware team, with emphasis on PHY bring up, RF calibrations, signal processing algorithm implementation and performance tuning.

- Work closely with product SW and manufacturing teams to provide system-level API and firmware functionality to meet productization needs. Develop SoC test and calibration capabilities for wafer, module, and system factories.

- Collaborate with RF/Radio design, DVT, PHY and System engineering teams to architect, define and implement innovative algorithms, calibrations and protocols.

- Debug realtime systems with limited visibility, working hands-on with development boards and lab equipment.

- Support pre-silicon validation efforts, including simulation, emulation, and FPGA prototyping.

- Support post-silicon bringup, validation, performance characterization, system integration and debug.

Minimum Qualifications

BS and 10+ years of relevant industry experience

Embedded systems knowledge including:
multi thread environment.
Interrupt thread processing/latency.
Multi core environment.
HW/FW semaphores/resource management.

Preferred Qualifications

Strong background in embedded FW development using C and assembly languages, familiarity with ARM CPUs and its internals.
Good understanding of embedded wireless communication systems, Radio and PHY fundamentals and key RF performance metrics.
Familiarity with digital signal processing algorithms.
Understanding python match library like numpy/SciPy and how to convert it to embedded C.
Understanding difference between fix point and floating points and how to make arithmetic tradeoff and simplify embedded usage.
Experience with low-level hardware interfaces, register and interrupt programming, bare-metal software development, clock and power management.
Solid understanding of basic embedded concepts such as RTOS, concurrency, multi-processor systems.
Fluency in using lab equipment such as logic analyzers, oscilloscopes, network analyzers, spectrum analyzers, signal generators, and power meters.
Experience implementing diagnostics, manufacturing tests, and protocol compliance software.
Knowledgeable of industry standards for wireless communications such as Bluetooth, WLAN, ZigBee, UWB is a plus.
Proficient in at least one of the scripting languages such as Python, Perl, or Tcl.
Excellent communication skills – both written and oral.

About this role

Summary

Develop and debug firmware for wireless silicon, focusing on PHY, RF calibration, and signal processing.

Job title

Wireless RF PHY Firmware Engineer

Experience level

10+ years

Minimum experience

10+ years exp

Industry

software

Location requirements

Irvine, San Diego, Sunnyvale; remote not specified

Salary

Not specified

Management role

No

Skills & keywords

Required skills

embedded systemsCassemblyARMRF fundamentalsdigital signal processingPython

Preferred skills

assemblyARM internalsRF performance metricsFPGA prototypinglab equipment

Specializations

embedded firmwareRFPHYsignal processingprotocols
Locations

Structured locations inferred from the posting.

Irvine, CA, USA

On-site City

San Diego, CA, USA

On-site City

Sunnyvale, CA, USA

On-site City