Senior Platform Applications Engineer (f/m/d)

We are seeking a skilled Senior Platform Applications Engineer at Black Semiconductor to enable successful customer adoption of our next-generation Optical Compute Interconnect (OCI) technology. Working closely with Product, Photonics, Packaging, Test Engineering, and Commercial teams, you will help customers successfully deploy our technology while providing valuable feedback from the field to drive future product improvements. Your work will span platform integration, high-speed system validation, reference design development, and technical support across the product lifecycle. This role combines high-speed hardware platforms, FPGA and ASIC bring-up, optical interconnect technologies, system validation, and customer-facing technical engineering.

• Guide customers in integrating Black Semiconductor products into ecosystem solutions such as switches, NICs, accelerators, ASICs, and FPGA-based platforms.
• Support customer bring-up and debug activities, including link training, BER validation, interoperability testing, firmware configuration, and system-level issue resolution.
• Develop example schematics, reference boards, application notes, and integration guides covering power delivery, clocking, fiber and cable routing, management interfaces, pinouts, register maps, and thermal and mechanical guidelines. Contribute to SDKs and PDKs where appropriate.
• Work closely with Product, Photonics, Packaging, and Test Engineering teams to communicate field issues, customer feedback, and feature requests that help shape future product development.
• Support pre-sales activities including evaluations, demonstrations, and benchmarking, as well as post-sales debugging, technical escalations, customer training, and on-site laboratory support for key accounts.

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Physics, or a related technical field, or equivalent industry experience.
• Strong experience with FPGA and ASIC SerDes bring-up, including demonstration and evaluation board PCB design, RTL development, IP integration, embedded software, tool flows, high-speed measurements, and interposer validation.
• Strong customer-facing communication skills with the ability to explain complex signal integrity and optical system concepts, write technical application documentation, and coordinate multi-stakeholder debugging activities.
• Good understanding of optical interconnect technologies, including optical transceivers, Co-Packaged Optics (CPO), optical chiplets, link budgets, NRZ/PAM4 modulation, equalization, and high-speed standards such as Ethernet, PCIe, CXL, and JESD204.
• Programming and scripting experience for PC-based platforms to control demonstrations, automate experiments, interface with test equipment, and analyze data.
• Hands-on experience using laboratory equipment including oscilloscopes, voltmeters, logic analyzers, pattern generators, and related high-speed debug tools.
• Experience with FPGA programming and development tool flows.
• Familiarity with PCB CAD tools for schematic capture and layout, Microsoft Office, and engineering documentation and drawing tools.

• Flexibility and work-life harmony—we ensure work adapts to life, not the other way around
• Autonomy to make a lasting impact and continuous learning opportunities
• Comprehensive benefits package with outstanding insurance, pension and virtual stock options for mental, physical, and financial health