Software & Firmware Engineering Experts

CodingRemotePart-timeAlways-open talent poolPosted Sep 26

Mercor keeps this listing open to build a pool of candidates. Applying puts you in the pool; it is not a single fresh opening.

Mercor is seeking experienced Software and Firmware Engineers to support an advanced engineering and AI research initiative with a leading technology organization. We are looking for deeply hands-on engineers who have designed, implemented, integrated, tested, debugged, or validated software and firmware that directly interfaces with real-world hardware systems.

Relevant backgrounds include

Embedded Firmware Engineering
FPGA / RTL Engineering
Flight Software Engineering
Hardware Test Automation Engineering

This role is particularly well suited for engineers who have worked directly on complex physical products and can bring practical engineering judgment to evaluating embedded systems, firmware, digital hardware, flight software, hardware-in-the-loop testing, and real-world debugging workflows.

Key Responsibilities

Apply hands-on software, firmware, and digital hardware expertise to technically complex engineering tasks involving real physical systems.
Review and evaluate embedded firmware, FPGA/RTL designs, flight software, test automation frameworks, hardware interfaces, and system-level engineering workflows.
Analyze architecture and implementation trade-offs involving real-time performance, timing, memory, compute resources, interfaces, reliability, fault handling, concurrency, and hardware/software integration.

You’re a Strong Fit If You Have

5+ years of professional software, firmware, FPGA, or embedded systems engineering experience, including at least 3 years of recent, actively hands-on experience developing, integrating, testing, bringing up, or troubleshooting software/firmware on real hardware—not solely program or people management.

Demonstrated experience as the responsible engineer for production hardware-connected software or firmware, owning meaningful portions of the lifecycle from requirements and architecture through implementation, integration, hardware bring-up, verification, validation, debugging, and deployment.

Deep technical expertise in at least one core domain: embedded firmware and real-time systems; FPGA/RTL design and verification; flight software and safety/mission-critical systems; or hardware test automation and hardware-in-the-loop infrastructure.

Strong practical command of relevant technologies such as C/C++, Python, RTOS/bare-metal development, device drivers, bootloaders, embedded Linux, SPI/I²C/UART/CAN/Ethernet, Verilog/SystemVerilog/VHDL, FPGA toolchains, hardware interfaces, telemetry, and automated test systems, as applicable to the candidate's specialization.

Extensive hands-on experience debugging software-hardware interactions and physical systems using tools such as JTAG/SWD debuggers, logic analyzers, oscilloscopes, hardware simulators/emulators, HIL/SIL environments, automated test equipment, CI infrastructure, and structured root-cause analysis.

Proven experience developing systems in real-world product or hardware manufacturing environments, ideally across aerospace/defense, space, automotive/EV, semiconductors, consumer electronics, robotics/eVTOL, industrial/energy, or medical devices—e.g., Lockheed Martin, RTX, Boeing, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, SpaceX, Tesla, Rivian, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Intel, AMD, Apple, Google, Meta, Amazon, Skydio, Shield AI, Joby, Boston Dynamics, Siemens, ABB, Medtronic, or Intuitive Surgical—with the ability to clearly explain architectural decisions, implementation trade-offs, test results, and failure mechanisms.

Software & Firmware Engineering Experts

Relevant backgrounds include

Key Responsibilities

More coding roles

Software & Firmware Engineering Experts

Relevant backgrounds include

Key Responsibilities

More coding roles

Preferred Background

Why Join

You’re a Strong Fit If You Have

The application process