Senior Embedded Security Software Engineer

About the role

The Technology Innovation Institute is seeking a senior software engineer with deep expertise in embedded security and real‑time firmware. You will design, implement and maintain firmware for a tamper‑detection system that protects cryptographic material on PCBs, working with low‑power ARM Cortex‑M MCUs and Zephyr RTOS.

Key responsibilities

• Develop and maintain ultra‑low‑power real‑time firmware in C/C++ on ARM Cortex‑M devices under Zephyr (or comparable) RTOS.
• Implement secure boot chains, signed firmware images, secure update mechanisms and on‑device key management.
• Design sensor acquisition pipelines, apply DSP techniques, and create algorithms that reliably distinguish tamper events from environmental noise.
• Perform SoC/MCU bring‑up on NXP and NVIDIA platforms, integrate drivers, and validate end‑to‑end communication with host systems.
• Contribute to threat modeling, security reviews and certification evidence for standards such as ISO/IEC 19790, FIPS 140 and Common Criteria.

Required profile

• 5‑8 years of professional embedded software development experience, preferably in defense, aerospace or security‑critical products.
• BSc or MSc in Electrical/Electronic Engineering, Computer Science, Embedded Systems or related field.
• Proven experience delivering firmware through integration, test and production stages.

Required skills

• Embedded C/C++ development on ARM Cortex‑M microcontrollers.
• Zephyr RTOS (or FreeRTOS/ThreadX) and real‑time, interrupt‑driven design.
• Digital signal processing: ADC interfacing, digital filtering, spectral analysis, feature extraction.
• Secure boot (MCUboot), signed firmware, key provisioning, zeroisation and anti‑rollback mechanisms.
• SoC bring‑up on NXP and/or NVIDIA platforms, BSP integration and Linux/Yocto familiarity.
• Low‑power design and battery‑backed always‑on operation.
• Version control (Git), CI/CD pipelines, automated unit/integration testing and hardware‑in‑the‑loop setups.
• Docker (optional) and strong English communication skills.