Software R&D Engineer, VLSI Physical Design - New College Grad 2026

NVIDIA AI is a leading hardware company known for its innovative designs and optimization tools. They are seeking a Software R&D Engineer to develop advanced VLSI Physical Design algorithms, focusing on enhancing chip frequency and power efficiency through creative software solutions.

What you'll do:

• Invent new optimization engines that fuse traditionally independent engines (e.g., co-optimization of legalization and sizing) with the objective of increasing chip frequency while minimizing power consumption across a suite of internal optimization tools
• Improve algorithms (in C++) for gate-level sizing, buffering, useful clock skew, cell legalization, power minimization, ECO routing, and incremental parasitic extraction
• We as a team own the whole process from discovery and invention of new optimization opportunities, to developing solutions and working directly inside design teams to facilitate deployment

What they're looking for:

• Masters or PhD in Electrical Engineer or Computer Science (or equivalent experience)
• Experience with VLSI algorithms development using C++
• Understanding of VLSI timing optimization and related concepts, including cell libraries, interconnect models, crosstalk, glitches, IR drop, timing constraints, corners, congestion, etc
• Familiarity with design implementation tools such as ICC2, Innovus, PrimeTime, Tempus, and StarRC and typical design flows written in Perl, Tcl, and Python
• C++14 or newer experience, such as lambdas and concurrency
• Understanding of how multiple Physical Design steps interact and how they can potentially be fused together to form hybrid engines that result in better PPA
• Experience in high performance software design including multithreading, distributed computing, efficient memory and I/O use, etc
• Highly driven to craft software towards improving PPA with a dedication to continuous improvement
• Experience with reinforcement learning, GNNs (Graph Neural Networks), and other relevant machine learning frameworks, especially as applied to physical design

Benefits:

• Eligible for equity and benefits