Platform Hardware Competitive Analysis Engineer

Title: Platform HW Competitive Analysis Engineer

Location: Austin, TX (Onsite).

Duration: 12 Months (Possible extension).

Job Duties:

1. Board Analysis:

• Analyze CPU/APU/GPU printed circuit boards (PCBs) from various vendors and systems, including notebooks, PC motherboards, and GPU cards.
• Identify electrical components and use reverse engineering techniques to understand board topology, architecture, power tree, and key interfaces.

2. Bill of Materials (BOM) Estimation:

• Collaborate with component engineers to create estimated BOM files, identifying components with unclear traits.
• Utilize the internal cost database to estimate board costs and compare with internal/customer designs.

3. PCB Stack-Up Analysis:

• Engage with PCB delamination shops for stack-up analysis, identifying high-speed interfaces and dielectric materials.
• Analyze vias, pad stacks, and trace geometries to determine competitor chip ball-out for key interfaces.

4. Power Instrumentation:

• Conduct power instrumentation on boards using standardized benchmarks to measure system efficiency.
• Measure incoming and output power across various ASIC rails.

5. Reporting and Recommendations:

• Prepare reports highlighting cost differences and design/architecture features affecting cost.
• Provide recommendations for future competitive platform designs.

Requirements:

• Bachelor's degree in Electrical/Electronic Engineering.
• 3-5 years of experience in platform hardware design/analysis.
• Proficiency in high-speed digital interfaces (e.g., LPDDR, GDDR, PCIe, USB, DP, eDP, HDMI, SPI, eSPI).
• Experience with complex PCB and system assemblies using FFC/custom cables and interfaces.
• Familiarity with PCB BOM cost optimization through design simplification while maintaining functionality and reliability.
• Experience collaborating with silicon vendors and suppliers for cost-effective design solutions.
• Previous experience in competitive BOM analysis and benchmarking power/efficiency /performance is a plus.