Principal Debug Validation Engineer
Graphcore is a Bristol-based AI chipmaker (IPU accelerators), a SoftBank subsidiary and a Molten Ventures portfolio company.
Maintainer signals as of 8/20/2026
About Graphcore
Graphcore (graphcore.ai) is a British semiconductor company building Intelligence Processing Units (IPUs) for AI workloads. Founded in Bristol in 2016, it was acquired by SoftBank in 2024. It is a portfolio company of Molten Ventures.
Skills
Candidate Availability
Required and preferred rules are kept separate and reflect the wording in the original posting.
About the Role
You will lead post-silicon debug and validation for AI compute silicon and platforms. You will investigate complex hardware, firmware, software and system issues, develop debug methodologies and automation, analyse system data, improve validation coverage, communicate technical risks and support readiness and release decisions.
Requirements
- Strong experience in bare-metal environments
- Knowledge of SoC and platform architectures
- Expertise in debug infrastructure and post-silicon debug methodologies
- Strong Python or C programming skills
- Debug scripting experience with CMM
- Experience with post-silicon validation in digital ASIC environments
- Strong Linux and Python experience
- Knowledge of scan, DFT, JTAG and trace infrastructure
- Fault tree analysis skills
- Failure isolation skills
- Fishbone methodology knowledge
- System-level debugging skills
- Experience parsing and analysing debug data
- Driver-level experience with PCIe, Ethernet, LPDDR, DDR, HBM, I2C, I3C or SPI
- Experience with CoreSight, CTI, ETx, DStream, JLink, Lauterbach, ATB or STM
- Knowledge of PLLs, high-speed PHYs and IC control or communication protocols
- Experience with Arm CPU architectures and system IP
- Experience with AMBA protocols
- Understanding of ML applications and workloads
- Experience in characterization, failure analysis, test development, statistical analysis or customer support
Responsibilities
- Lead post-silicon debug and validation activities
- Prioritise, plan and execute activities across projects and milestones
- Investigate and resolve silicon, firmware, software and system issues
- Develop debug methodologies and failure analysis processes
- Identify root causes and implement corrective actions
- Debug CPU, memory, interconnect and high-speed I/O subsystems
- Develop automated debug and validation infrastructure with Python
- Analyse logs, traces, telemetry and hardware data
- Develop validation tests, debug tooling and diagnostics
- Define validation metrics, workflows and reporting standards
- Improve debug processes and validation methodologies
- Communicate technical risks, status and recommendations
- Support silicon readiness reviews
- Contribute to product quality and release decisions
Benefits
- Flexible working
- Medical coverage
- Dental coverage
- Vision coverage
- Flexible Spending Accounts
- Health Savings Accounts
- Disability insurance
- Life insurance
- 401(k) retirement plan
- Commuter benefits
- Wellness services
- Employee Assistance Programme