Senior Firmware Engineer

Helion

340

Everett, WA, United States

Posted on: 2025-10-31

Category: renewables

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Employment type:

Full time

Experience required:

Senior

Salary

Salary not provided

About the company:

We are a fusion power company based in Everett, WA, with the mission to build the world's first fusion power plant, enabling a future with unlimited clean electricity. Our vision is a world with clean, reliable, and affordable energy for everyone.

Since Helion's founding in 2013, we have raised over $1 billion from long-time investors such as Sam Altman, Mithril, and Capricorn Investment Group and new investors SoftBank and Lightspeed to propel us forward. Our last prototype, Trenta, completed 10,000 high-power pulses and reached plasma temperatures of 100 million degrees Celsius (9 keV). Now, we're turning up operations for Polaris, and working towards delivering the world's first fusion power plant.

More than ever, it's a pivotal time to join us and have the opportunity to solve real challenges to create a better energy future. You will see first-hand how we value urgency, rigor, ownership, and hard truths, knowing it will take each to do what no one has before. Joining us, you will push the boundaries of what's possible and transform humanity for the better - because the world can't wait.

About Helion

Since Helion's founding in 2013, we have raised over $1 billion from long-time investors such as Sam Altman, Mithril, and Capricorn Investment Group as well as new investors SoftBank and Lightspeed to propel us forward. Our last prototype, Trenta, completed 10,000 high-power pulses and reached plasma temperatures of 100 million degrees Celsius (9 keV). We are now operating Polaris, our next prototype on the path to the world's first fusion power plant.

This is a pivotal time to join Helion. You will tackle real-world challenges with a team that prizes urgency, rigor, ownership, and a commitment to delivering hard truths – values essential to achieving what no one has before. Together, we will change the future of energy, because the world can't wait.

What You Will Be Doing:
As a Senior Firmware Engineer, you will develop the embedded systems that power the control, diagnostics, and protection layers of our fusion machines. You’ll write and maintain firmware that runs on thousands of distributed embedded devices controlling and monitoring tens of thousands of sensors, actuators, and data channels. This role bridges hardware and software — you’ll work closely with electrical and software engineers to design reliable, scalable, and high-performance control and data acquisition systems. You’ll help define communication protocols, improve time synchronization across embedded networks, and automate hardware bring-up and testing. This position is ideal for an engineer who enjoys working close to the metal, debugging complex systems, and rapidly iterating on real-world hardware to make fusion power a practical reality.

You Will:

Develop, test, and maintain firmware for real-time embedded systems used in machine control and diagnostics
Work closely with hardware and software engineers to translate system requirements into embedded designs
Bring up new boards, sensors, and actuators — debugging with oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and JTAG interfaces
Implement and maintain low-level communication protocols (UART, SPI, I²C, CAN, EtherCAT, etc.)
Design and refine embedded command interfaces, configuration utilities, and automated test frameworks
Optimize performance, reliability, and timing synchronization across distributed embedded systems
Contribute to continuous improvement of embedded toolchains, build systems, and test automation
Rapidly prototype novel control and measurement concepts to support new machine architectures
Collaborate across disciplines to ensure firmware integrates seamlessly with high-level software and data systems

Required Skills:

BS or higher in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or Computer Science
8+ years of experience developing embedded systems in C, C++, and/or Rust
Experience with real-time MCU development (bare metal or RTOS-based)
Strong understanding of digital communication protocols (UART, SPI, I²C)
Familiarity with mixed-signal circuit design and debugging using oscilloscopes, DMMs, and logic analyzers
Experience with version control systems (Git)
Scripting experience in Python for automation, hardware bring-up, or testing
Solid grasp of embedded systems fundamentals: power, timing, data, and memory budgets
Experience developing and debugging on Linux-based systems

#LI-Onsite #LI-KL1

Total Compensation and Benefits

Helion's compensation package includes a competitively benchmarked base salary, meaningful equity grants, and comprehensive benefits. Final compensation is determined through a holistic evaluation of your experience, qualifications, and our commitment to internal equity - ensuring fairness and transparency across our teams. We are committed to fostering a fair and equitable environment in every aspect of our operations, including compensation.

This is an exempt salaried role.

Annual Base Pay

$150,000—$194,000 USD

Benefits

Our total compensation package includes benefits, including but not limited to:

• Medical, Dental, and Vision plans for employees and their families
• 31 Days of PTO (21 vacation days and 10 sick days)
• 10 Paid holidays, plus company-wide winter break
• Up to 5% employer 401(k) match
• Short term disability, long term disability, and life insurance
• Paid parental leave and support (up to 16 weeks)
• Annual wellness stipend

Helion is an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. If you need assistance or an accommodation during the interview process, please let us know.

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