Principal Engineer/Director-Engineering, Linux Kernel Development

Company:

Qualcomm India Private Limited

Job Area:

Engineering Group, Engineering Group > Software Engineering

General Summary:

We are looking for a highly skilled and experienced Principal Engineer to lead the design, development, and upstreaming of Linux kernel features for our next-generation Arm-based Server SoCs. This role is ideal for a hands-on technical leader who thrives at the intersection of hardware and software, and is passionate about building robust, scalable, and high-performance Linux platforms for data center and cloud infrastructure.

You will play a critical role in defining kernel architecture, enabling new hardware features, and ensuring compliance with industry standards such as Arm SystemReady SR, BSA, SBSA, and BBR.

Key Responsibilities

• Will be part of architecture and development of Linux kernel features for Armv8/v9-based server SoCs.
• Drive upstream contributions to the mainline Linux kernel, ensuring long-term maintainability and community alignment.
• Collaborate with hardware, firmware, and platform teams to enable new SoC features (e.g., RAS, SMMU, GIC, ACPI).
• Develop and maintain kernel drivers, subsystems, and board support packages (BSPs).
• Guide the integration of compliance test suites such as FWTS, BSA-ACS, SBSA-ACS, and SystemReady SR validation tools.
• Lead kernel bring-up on new silicon and virtual platforms
• Mentor junior engineers and contribute to technical reviews, design documentation, and architectural decisions
• Represent the company in open-source communities and industry working groups

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or related field.
• 17+ years of experience in Linux kernel development, with a strong focus on Arm architecture.
• Deep understanding of kernel subsystems such as memory management, scheduler, device drivers, power management, and interrupt handling.
• Proven experience in upstreaming patches and working with the Linux kernel community.
• Familiarity with server-class SoC features: NUMA, RAS, ACPI, PCIe, CXL, and secure boot.
• Experience with platform enablement and compliance validation (e.g., SystemReady SR, FWTS, ACS).
• Strong debugging skills using tools like ftrace, perf, kgdb, crash, and kernel logs.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with virtualization (KVM, Xen) and container technologies (Docker, Kubernetes).
• Contributions to open-source projects or maintainership of kernel subsystems.
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines for kernel testing and validation.
• Knowledge of firmware interfaces (UEFI, ACPI, Devicetree) and bootloaders (U-Boot, EDK2).

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Information Systems, Computer Science, or related field and 8+ years of Software Engineering or related work experience.

OR
Master's degree in Engineering, Information Systems, Computer Science, or related field and 7+ years of Software Engineering or related work experience.
OR
PhD in Engineering, Information Systems, Computer Science, or related field and 6+ years of Software Engineering or related work experience.

• 4+ years of work experience with Programming Language such as C, C++, Java, Python, etc.

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