Software Engineer, Systems

Job Description

Position: Staff Software Engineer, Systems. Location: Palo Alto, California, United States (Remote Eligible)‍‍

This is an opportunity to help design and implement the operating system for a photonic quantum computer and develop the tools and frameworks essential for its calibration, initialization, and fault tolerance.

Responsibilities:

• Design, implement, optimize, and maintain systems-level software for photonic quantum computing systems.
• Develop automated calibration, system initialization, and hardware bring-up routines;
• Create management tools for system monitoring and control.
• Build diagnostic software for real-time fault detection and isolation;
• Design and implement interfaces between hardware subsystems and control software.
• Optimize performance through system characterization and fine-tuning.
• Develop protocols for system commissioning and verification.
• Manage system configurations and ensure version control.
• Collaborate with hardware, simulation, and cross-functional engineering teams to maintain software compatibility.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or related field (or equivalent experience).
• 10+ years of experience developing systems software for hardware-intensive platforms.
• Proficiency in C++, Python, or Rust;
• Experience designing and implementing hardware abstraction layers.
• Familiarity with communication protocols such as I²C, SPI, and PCIe.
• Strong understanding of real-time operating systems;
• Skilled in automated test frameworks and continuous integration.
• Hands-on experience with instrumentation control and data acquisition systems.
• Deep debugging, diagnostics, and problem-solving skills;
• Experience with hardware-in-the-loop testing or co-design environments.
• Demonstrated ability to commission complex systems and implement robust error-handling mechanisms.
• Familiarity with collaborative development tools and workflows (e.g., version control systems).

Preferred:

• Understanding of quantum computing principles and operations.
• Experience with APIs (RESTful, gRPC), data serialization formats (protobufs, JSON).
• Background in workflow platforms such as Apache Airflow.
• Experience with VM, bare-metal, or container orchestration.
• High-performance I/O coding in Python;
• Python-to-Rust transpiling or integration.
• Experience working with photonic systems and optical calibration.
• Knowledge of control theory, signal processing, and digital filters.
• Experience developing GUIs and scientific instrumentation UIs;
• DevOps tools and infrastructure-as-code familiarity.
• Laboratory automation and environmental control system experience.

Additional Notes:

• PsiQuantum is an equal opportunity employer. Discrimination of any kind is not tolerated.
• Official correspondence will only come from a PsiQuantum email address. We will never request bank information during the hiring process.
• Please report suspicious activity to: recruiting@psiquantum.com;
• Third-party agencies should not submit unsolicited resumes.