Electrical Engineer, Compute Architecture

Location: Austin, Texas, United States; South San Francisco, California, United States

Department: Surgery & Robot Hardware

Team Description:

The Surgery & Robotics Hardware Team is looking for Electrical Engineers who want to advance the future of healthcare solutions with technology. At Neuralink we recognize that increasing healthcare costs, lack of access, and insufficient numbers of neurosurgeons globally require new approaches to enable greater access to our devices. To address these challenges we design fully autonomous robotics systems, human assistive surgical tools, and design entire surgical suites in order to provide better experiences for our customers.

Our team works on our surgical robot system which aims to fully automate the implantation of the Neuralink implant. We design and integrate multi-axis robotic arms, perception systems including custom imaging hardware, optical coherence tomography tissue imaging, power electronics, and safety systems such as 3D spatial mapping/object avoidance sensors. Robotics is part of a larger system of tools we work on. For example, using pre-op MRI scans we generate patient anatomy data that we later use in surgery to register precise surgery site locations. 

In addition to research and development of modern surgical technology, we also are responsible for bringing these technologies to market. We perform full lifecycle testing for all devices we design and ultimately manufacture them for use in human surgeries. To date, our designs have served over 20 individuals, and in the coming years our designs will serve thousands of individuals who wish to use our implant technology.

Job Description and Responsibilities:

As an Electrical Engineer on the Surgery & Robot Hardware Team, you will be expected to design, verify, and oversee the transition to production of a variety of custom electronics systems with a primary emphasis on FPGA-based hardware and real-time processing. This role offers substantial autonomy and the exciting opportunity to own creative decisions and execute on new, impactful projects such as high-speed image processing pipelines, real-time motor control, custom camera designs, robotics stage sensor integration, manufacturing automation, and the firmware that enables all of these devices.

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering or a related field or equivalent experience
• Professional experience delivering on all phases of electronics design (requirements, part selection, schematic, layout, manufacturing, test)
• Strong demonstrated depth in FPGA Hardware Design: Experience designing FPGA-based systems for time-sensitive and high-performance applications such as image processing, high-speed data acquisition, real-time networking, and control systems. This includes:
• FPGA device selection and architecture definition
• RTL development (Verilog / SystemVerilog)
• Digital signal processing theory and implementation
• High-speed interface design (PCIe, MIPI, SLVS-EC, LVDS, JESD204, Ethernet, etc.)
• Timing closure, clock domain crossing, and resource optimization
• Integration of high-speed transceivers and external PHY devices
• Hardware validation, lab debugging, and performance tuning of real-time FPGA systems
• Practical electronics design knowledge including designing for EMC, ESD, thermals, and packaging

Preferred Qualifications:

• A portfolio showcasing your hardware designs (especially FPGA-based projects)
• Demonstrable experience developing electronics for safety-critical systems such as medical devices, aerospace, automotive, or military
• Altium experience