Physical Design Engineer

About the Position

Physical Design Engineer

OpenAI is seeking a highly skilled Physical Design Engineer to optimize datapath and interconnect solutions for next-generation AI accelerators.

Location

San Francisco, California, United States

Employment Type

Full time

Compensation

• $266K – $445K • Offers Equity

The base pay offered may vary depending on multiple individualized factors, including market location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. If the role is non-exempt, overtime pay will be provided consistent with applicable laws. In addition to the salary range listed above, total compensation also includes generous equity, performance-related bonus(es) for eligible employees, and the following benefits.

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts
• Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses (parking and transit)
• 401(k) retirement plan with employer match
• Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents), plus paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks)
• Paid time off: flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees
• 13+ paid company holidays, and multiple paid coordinated company office closures throughout the year for focus and recharge, plus paid sick or safe time (1 hour per 30 hours worked, or more, as required by applicable state or local law)
• Mental health and wellness support
• Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage
• Annual learning and development stipend to fuel your professional growth
• Daily meals in our offices, and meal delivery credits as eligible
• Relocation support for eligible employees
• Additional taxable fringe benefits, such as charitable donation matching and wellness stipends, may also be provided.

More details about our benefits are available to candidates during the hiring process.

This role is at-will and OpenAI reserves the right to modify base pay and other compensation components at any time based on individual performance, team or company results, or market conditions.

About the Team

OpenAI’s Hardware organization develops AI-native silicon and system-level solutions for the unique demands of advanced AI workloads. Building on efforts like Jalapeño, the team is developing future generations of AI-native silicon and tightly integrated systems to power the next generation of frontier models. By co-designing chips, systems, tools, and methodologies, the team helps deliver faster, more efficient, and production-ready hardware for OpenAI’s supercomputing platform.

About the Role

We are seeking a highly skilled Physical Design Engineer with deep expertise in physical design and methodology. This individual contributor role sits within our physical design team and is central to delivering power, performance, and area (PPA) optimized datapath and interconnect solutions for next-generation AI accelerators.

You’ll work closely with RTL designers to define and execute on physical design strategies. You will develop tools, flows and methodologies to increase team productivity. Your work will directly impact silicon’s performance and cost efficiency, as well as the team’s execution velocity and quality.

Responsibilities

• Develop, build and own tools, flows and methodologies for physical implementation
• Own physical implementation of floorplan blocks from floorplanning to final signoff
• Collaborate with RTL designers to drive optimal block implementation solutions
• Analyze and optimize design for timing, power, and area trade-offs, working in collaboration with EDA vendors and ASIC partners

Requirements

• BS with 4+ or MS with 2+ years or PhD with 0-1 year(s) of relevant industry experience in physical design and methodology development
• Demonstrated success in taping out complex silicon designs
• Hands-on experience with block physical implementation and PPA convergence
• Strong coding experience with Python, Bazel, TCL
• Strong experience building physical design tools, flows and methodologies
• Strong understanding of microarchitecture, RTL design, physical design, circuit design, physical verification and timing closure.
• Deep familiarity with industry-standard tools and flows for physical synthesis, PNR, LEC and power estimation

Bonus

• Experience with AI or HPC-focused chips
• Experience with optimizing PPA for high performance compute cores
• Hands-on experience with top-level design methodologies

We Offer

• Competitive salary
• Generous equity
• Performance-related bonuses
• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision insurance
• Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses
• 401(k) retirement plan with employer match
• Paid parental leave
• Paid time off
• Paid holidays and office closures
• Paid medical and caregiver leave
• Mental health and wellness support
• Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage
• Annual learning and development stipend
• Daily meals in our offices
• Relocation support
• Additional taxable fringe benefits

About the Company

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity.

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

For additional information, please see OpenAI’s Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.

Background checks for applicants will be administered in accordance with applicable law, and qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment consistent with those laws, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act, for US-based candidates.

To notify OpenAI that you believe this job posting is non-compliant, please submit a report through this form. No response will be provided to inquiries unrelated to job posting compliance.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities, and requests can be made via this link.

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