Senior Optical Hardware Validation Engineer Location: London (Hybrid)
Salary: £60,000 – £80,000 + Benefits
Visa & Relocation: Support available for qualified candidates
This role would suit an electronics or optical engineer with experience of highspeed fibreoptic network electronics integration, test and validation.
The opportunity:
This is an exciting and new opportunity to join a start-up involved with the research, development and design of optical / photonic technologies. Their technologies are designed to radically improve network speed and energy efficiency of AI / ML applications.
The role:
Involves the systems integration of optical transceiver and other photonics hardware. Also, test, prototyping, characterization and validation of their ultra-fast optical hardware products.
As a Senior Optical Engineer, you’ll take an active, hands-on role in lab-based experimentation, hardware integration, and system-level validation. Working closely with multidisciplinary design teams, you’ll bring together advanced electronics (SoC / high speed boards) and optical technologies, helping to move products from prototype to production readiness.
Typical involvements - Senior Optical Engineer / Hardware Validation Engineer
* Integrate and test very high-speed optical / photonic and electronic hardware systems
* Assess optical transmission and network performance for short-reach AI Networked Systems
* Develop and execute test plans for high-speed optical transceivers across the full product lifecycle (prototype, validation, production).
* Perform electrical and optical characterisation of transceivers, specifically in burst-mode Tx/Rx testing.
* Analyse test data to identify performance margins, failure modes, and opportunities for design/manufacturing improvements.
* Optimise receiver performance through equalisation tuning (CTLE, DFE, FFE) and characterise link margins.
* Design and execute automated test and characterisation routines for prototypes and NPI systems.
* Analyse and optimise system-level performance across electrical and optical domains.
Candidates should be collaborative, analytical, and hands-on approach to solving complex engineering challenges
Skills / Knowledge Required: Senior Optical Engineer / Hardware Validation Engineer
* MSc or PhD degree in optical communications, photonics, physics, electronics engineering or other relevant areas
* Proven experience working in industry on similar high-speed electronics/ transceivers / optical modules (e.g. >50 Ghz : >10Gbps)
* Strong background in optical / photonic or high-speed electronic system integration, testing, validation, or integration.
* Understanding of signal integrity, high-speed PCB design considerations, and packaging impacts on performance.
* Experience with fibre-optic communication systems testing (OLT, ONT, PON) and integration.
* Expertise in burst-mode transceiver characterisation.
* Solid understanding of equalisation techniques (CTLE, FFE, DFE) for improving high-speed link performance.
* Proficiency in using high-speed measurement instruments (e.g., sampling oscilloscopes, BERTs, burst-mode analysers).
* Familiarity with optical components (lasers, photodiodes, burst-mode APDs/TIAs, modulators) and transceiver architectures.
Others (beneficial):
* Strong hands-on experience in optical / photonic communication systems development and testing, ideally at 100Gbps and above.
* Experience with automated test systems and scripting (e.g., Python, Matlab, C++, C#).
* A strong and demonstrable interest in sustainable technologies, AI, ML and / or HPC would be preferred.
This is a great opportunity to join a highly technical team driving innovation in next-generation AI / ML networking hardware.
The Senior Optical Engineer opening is based in central London (hybrid). Assistance can be granted to obtain working visas.