Firmware (FPGA) Engineer

Thales people provide armed forces customers with operational advantage at every decisive moment throughout the mission. Defence and armed forces customers rely on us to deliver the full range of defence mission systems solutions at land, sea, and air. Our platforms extend across the battlespace including Above and Sonar, Electronic Combat, and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance systems.

Together we offer fantastic opportunities for committed employees to learn and develop their career with us. At Thales UK, we research, develop, and supply technology and services that impact the lives of millions of people each day to make life better, and keep us safer. We innovate across the major industries of Aerospace, Defence, Security and Space. Your health and well-being matters to us and that’s why we offer you the flexibility to do what’s important to you; whether that’s part time hours, job sharing, home working, or the ability to flex your start and finish times. Where possible, we support a working pattern that suits your lifestyle and helps you reach your ambitions.

Become a key part of a team with a proven track record for delivering firmware for a wide range of defence, related products. Typical firmware services provided:

• Architecture, requirements specification, design, verification and validation.
• Working in conjunction with systems, software and hardware engineers to develop electronic systems.

Projects involve using the latest industry class development tools for FPGA and system on a chip hardware technology. Work is carried out to a structured firmware design process.

The roles is based on our Manor Royal site and can support a mix of on-site and remote working. There is a requirement to that periods of time to be spent at Customer sites and/or integration facilities.

As a People 1st Employer, we are passionate about providing you with opportunities to advance your engineering career and are committed to giving our employees the support they need to reach their professional goals. This includes support in submission of Professional Registration applications, funding membership of a professional body, and access to a wide variety of learning resources through our comprehensive e-Learning Engine. We also offer development pathways towards roles such as Firmware Architect, Firmware Engineering Manager, or a recognised Thales Specialist or Expert.

Each successful candidate will have demonstrable experience of Firmware engineering in the defence and/or transportation and/or aerospace domain and will ideally have experience interfacing with external customers as well as internal stakeholders.

The role holder reports to the Firmware Team Lead. The key individual responsibilities are:

• Work as part of firmware teams to deliver firmware projects to agreed time, cost and quality
• Verify firmware using Hardware Verification Languages or Hardware Description languages
• Design firmware using Hardware Description Languages
• Enhancement of firmware related processes (documenting, scripting, reporting, process automation)
• Working closely with multi-disciplinary teams

Desired knowledge, qualifications and experience

• Strong communications, verbally and in writing. A relevant degree (BEng, MEng, EngD, PhD) in electronics, supported by 5+ years of relevant experience.
• Membership or fellowship of a professional engineering body preferably with or working towards chartered status.

Specialisation/knowledge in some of the following:

• Verification Test bench architecture with System Verilog or C++
• Verification Methodology: Advanced VHDL verification or OSVVM/UVVM
• Requirements Management: IBM Rationale DOORS
• Simulation of designs using simulator tool: Mentor Graphics Modelsim / Questasim
• Digital electronic design in hardware development languages: VHDL and either Verilog or System Verilog
• Implementation of complex designs using any vendor specific development tools
• Technologies: PCIe, Ethernet, Serial Comms, AXI4
• Object Orientated design Techniques
• Image processing techniques and algorithms
• Algorithm development using development tool: MatLab
• Linux development environments

The successful candidate will be someone who:

• Is a team player with a “can-do” attitude that performs effectively in a multi-disciplinary team environment and promotes the values of inclusiveness and diversity
• Is confident in their ability to help solve complex problems, asks challenging questions to develop their understanding, and suggests new ideas to further our product offering and increase our added value
• Is a self-starter, with an ability to manage their own workload and meet their agreed objectives, whilst also contributing to the development and delivery of wider operational goals

Security Clearance Statement

Due to the nature of the work that we do at Thales, many of our roles are subject to security restrictions. This role requires you to be a UK National and achieve Security Clearance (SC) without any caveats. It would be advantageous if currently held, however, if not currently held, it is a requirement that the successful applicant undergo, achieve, and maintain SC Clearance prior to commencing employment. If approved by the MOD, a dual national from a Non-ITAR country may be considered. Please visit the UKSV website for further guidance.

To be eligible for full SC, you generally need to have resided in the UK for the last 5 years. In some circumstances, a minimum of 3 years’ residence in the UK over the last 5 years may be accepted, with additional overseas checks.

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At Thales we provide CAREERS and not only jobs. With Thales employing 80,000 employees in 68 countries our mobility policy enables thousands of employees each year to develop their careers at home and abroad, in their existing areas of expertise or by branching out into new fields. Together we believe that embracing flexibility is a smarter way of working.

Thales UK is committed to providing an inclusive and barrier-free recruitment process. We will provide reasonable adjustments and support to ensure neuro-diverse applicants or those with a disability or long-term condition can be their best during the recruitment process. To request an adjustment, if you need this job advert in an alternative format or if you have any questions about the recruitment process, please contact Resourcing Ops for mid to senior roles, or the Early Careers Team for graduate and apprentice roles.

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