Principal Electrical Design Engineer

Astera Labs (NASDAQ: ALAB) provides rack-scale AI infrastructure through purpose-built connectivity solutions. By collaborating with hyperscalers and ecosystem partners, Astera Labs enables organizations to unlock the full potential of modern AI. Astera Labs’ Intelligent Connectivity Platform integrates CXL®, Ethernet, NVLink, PCIe®, and UALink™ semiconductor-based technologies with the company’s COSMOS software suite to unify diverse components into cohesive, flexible systems that deliver end-to-end scale-up, and scale-out connectivity. The company’s custom connectivity solutions business complements its standards-based portfolio, enabling customers to deploy tailored architectures to meet their unique infrastructure requirements. Discover more at www.asteralabs.com.

Job Description

Principal Electrical Design Engineer

Board Hardware Engineering

Department: Hardware Engineering

Reports To: [Engineering Leadership]

Job Type: Full-Time, Exempt

Level: Principal Electrical Design Engineer (L4)

Location: San Jose, On-site

About The Role

We are seeking a Principal Electrical Design Engineer to define and drive the architecture, design, and technical strategy for advanced board-level hardware across next-generation networking and high-performance connectivity platforms. This role encompasses complex hardware systems including chassis boards, NIC cards, PCIe Gen6 platforms, and 800G Ethernet products.

This is a principal-level technical leadership role requiring deep domain expertise, strategic vision, and organizational influence. You will set the technical direction for board architecture, establish design methodologies, drive innovation in high-speed system design, and serve as the top technical authority across multiple programs. You will partner with and influence silicon, SI/PI, mechanical, firmware, manufacturing, system, and executive teams to deliver industry-leading products from concept through production and beyond.

Key Responsibilities

Technical Strategy and Architecture Leadership

Define and own the board-level hardware architecture and technical roadmap across multiple product lines and platform generations
Establish design standards, methodologies, and best practices that scale across the hardware engineering organization
Drive architectural tradeoff decisions for complex multi-layer PCBs integrating high-speed digital, analog, and mixed-signal circuitry, balancing performance, cost, schedule, and manufacturability
Get involved and drive discussions on stack-up strategy, impedance optimization and other SI relates development work
Own power delivery architecture strategy including multi-rail regulation topologies, advanced sequencing schemes, transient response optimization, protection philosophies, and power budgeting across platform generations
Define and evolve hardware implementation strategies for management and control interfaces such as I2C, SPI, GPIO, MDIO, and debug and observability architectures

Electrical Design Ownership

Own schematic capture and board-level design for complex multi-layer PCBs with high-speed digital, analog, and mixed-signal circuitry
Serve as the technical authority for board-level hardware development across high-performance server and connectivity platforms, including NIC cards, PCIe add-in cards, and chassis-integrated hardware
Provide technical oversight and approval for schematic capture and board-level designs across multiple designs
Lead component strategy and qualification roadmaps in partnership with suppliers, sourcing, and manufacturing teams
Drive design-for-excellence initiatives including DFT, DFM, and DFR to systematically improve manufacturability, yield, reliability, and production readiness across all programs

Bring-Up, Validation, and Debug Leadership

Define and own the bring-up and validation strategy for new hardware platforms, establishing frameworks that improve first-pass success rates across the organization
Lead root-cause analysis of the most complex and escalated hardware issues across high-speed interfaces, power delivery, clocks, resets, and control paths
Drive systemic improvements to debug methodologies, validation coverage, and failure analysis processes
Partner with firmware, software, and system teams to define and validate initialization sequences, telemetry, diagnostics, and platform-level functionality
Own corrective action frameworks and feed lessons learned into design standards and review processes

Cross-Functional Impact

Serve as the technical point of escalation and decision-maker for hardware design challenges across the organization
Work closely with SI/PI, mechanical, thermal, firmware, system, and manufacturing teams throughout the product lifecycle, driving alignment and resolving cross-domain technical conflicts
Interface with silicon vendors and internal ASIC teams at a strategic level on platform architecture, bring-up, errata resolution, compliance, and next-generation readiness
Mentor and develop senior and lead engineers, raising the technical bar across the hardware engineering team
Lead and contribute to design reviews and architectural reviews, and technical publications that advance the team’s collective expertise
Represent the hardware engineering organization in executive reviews, customer engagements, and industry forums as needed

Required Qualifications

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering or a closely related field; advanced degree preferred
12+ years of progressive hardware design experience with deep expertise in board-level electrical engineering and demonstrated technical leadership across multiple product generations
Extensive track record of architecting and delivering production hardware for server, networking, storage, or high-performance compute systems at scale
Expert-level experience with high-speed SerDes-based systems supporting Ethernet, PCIe, or related protocols; deep hands-on experience with PCIe Gen5/Gen6 and 400G/800G Ethernet system design
Expert understanding of signal integrity fundamentals including impedance control, differential pair routing, channel loss optimization, crosstalk mitigation, and layout review for high-speed interfaces
Expert power integrity and PDN design knowledge including advanced sequencing, decoupling strategies, transient response optimization, and power architecture tradeoffs at system level
Mastery of industry-standard schematic capture and PCB design and review tools such as Cadence Allegro or OrCAD
Proven track record leading hardware bring-up and debug of complex platforms using oscilloscopes, protocol analyzers, and advanced lab instrumentation
Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional teams and influence technical direction across organizational boundaries from architecture through validation and production
Strong track record of mentoring engineers and elevating team capabilities

Preferred Qualifications

Experience defining architecture for NIC cards, accelerator cards, or other PCIe add-in card platforms across multiple generations
Experience leading server chassis or system board design programs in dense, thermally constrained, high-availability environments
Deep expertise with 800G Ethernet and emerging 1.6T electrical interfaces and system integration challenges
Experience architecting solutions using retimers, redrivers, advanced clocking architectures, and high-speed interconnect subsystems
Expertise in compliance and validation workflows for PCIe and Ethernet platforms, including contributions to industry specifications or standards bodies
Experience driving contract manufacturer relationships, production ramp strategies, and yield optimization for complex hardware products
Scripting and automation proficiency in Python or similar languages for lab automation, measurement analysis, hardware characterization workflows, and design flow optimization
Experience influencing product strategy and roadmap decisions at the organizational level

Base pay range for this role is $185,000 - $240,000. Your base salary will be determined based on your location, experience, and the pay of employees in similar positions.

We know that creativity and innovation happen more often when teams include diverse ideas, backgrounds, and experiences, and we actively encourage everyone with relevant experience to apply, including people of color, LGBTQ+ and non-binary people, veterans, parents, and individuals with disabilities.
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