Embedded Firmware Engineer, Hardware Bring-up & Controls

About us

Voyant Photonics builds silicon photonic chips that steer and switch light at high speed. They power next generation, chip-scale FMCW LiDAR for robotics and autonomy, and optical circuit switches (OCS) for AI data centers. Based in NYC, we’re a hands-on team designing, building, and deploying frontier hardware to solve problems that matter, from how machines see to how AI scales.

The Role

We're hiring an embedded software engineer to bring up our new boards quickly and own the drivers and control firmware that run on them.

You care how an algorithm is implemented in firmware, but you're just as comfortable with the schematic open, a probe on the board and the soldering iron warm. About half your time goes to board bring-up, changing the firmware and the board together until everything comes up; the other half goes to implementing control loops and proving they work on hardware.

We are a collaborative, close knit team who love to solve complex problems and building robust systems. If you enjoy the challenge of working with frontier hardware, bringing up both brand new boards and cutting-edge control loops, we are excited to talk to you.

Your impact

Code is cheaper to write than ever. Knowing what should be written, and what "done" means, is the job. A board is done when it works, not when the firmware compiles; a loop is done when it meets its requirements on hardware, not when the simulation looks good. We want someone with strong, well-reasoned opinions about how control algorithms and drivers should be implemented in firmware, and how to prove they work, who argues for them, and who changes their mind when the evidence says so.

A few strong opinions the team holds:

Fix it at the source. A bug gets fixed where it lives, even when that's someone else's code. The friction of working in each other's areas is worth it.

Live at the tip. Every repo tracks the latest of everything it depends on. Small, frequent bumps surface breaks while they're still cheap to fix.

Duplicated code is broken code. Two copies drift apart, and then one of them is wrong.

It doesn't work until someone else has run it on hardware. Your own simulation or bench is where you start, not where you're done.

Disagree with one? Tell us why when you apply.

What You'll Do

Implement control algorithms in real-time embedded C++: discretization, sample-rate and latency budgets, anti-windup, saturation handling, and numerical robustness in fixed and floating point. Push back with measured data when the plant doesn't match the model.

Write the drivers and firmware structure each new board needs, and keep them clean enough that the next board reuses them.

Bring up each new board by changing the firmware and the board together: read the schematic and datasheets, probe signals, debug SPI, I2C, UART and custom chip interfaces, and make small SMT reworks when the board needs one.

Prove it works: build the test setups and Python analysis that show each driver and loop meets its requirements on hardware, from single PID loops to tuning many switch elements across a large optical network.

Feed what bring-up finds back to the hardware team so the next board revision comes up faster.

What We're Looking For

BS in computer engineering, computer science or a related field, with 2+ years of embedded software experience in a professional environment.

C or C++ on microcontrollers (ARM Cortex-M, STM32 or similar), bare-metal or RTOS. Our codebase is C++, but strong embedded C engineers are encouraged to apply.

Working control theory: PID, loop shaping and stability margins, and state-space design, and a feel for what each costs in firmware.

Board bring-up from the firmware side: schematics, datasheets, scopes and logic analyzers, and small reworks like swapping passives etc.

Python for test automation and data analysis.

Nice to Have

Measuring plant response and system identification on real hardware

MIMO and decoupling, observers, PLLs and tracking loops, or online optimization (e.g. extremum seeking) of multi-channel systems