AstroTalentSpace Jobs

Principal L1 PHY & Modem Implementation Engineer Verified today

Blue Origin · Kraków, Poland · RF & Comms · first seen 2026-10-09
Apply at Blue Origin →

About the Role

Blue Origin is pioneering TeraWave, a revolutionary satellite communications network designed to deliver symmetrical data speeds of up to 6 Tbps anywhere on Earth. This multi-orbit constellation will consist of optically interconnected satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO) and medium Earth orbit (MEO).

As Principal L1 PHY & Modem Implementation Engineer, you will develop and optimize L1 PHY and modem implementations for this high-throughput system. Working across physical-layer processing, DSP implementation, HW/SW partitioning, and modem integration, you will collaborate closely with modem architecture, DSP algorithms, ASIC, firmware, FPGA, BSP, and system engineering teams from pre-silicon development through integration and validation.

Key Responsibilities

  • Develop and optimize L1 PHY and modem implementations for high-throughput satellite communication systems.
  • Implement and integrate PHY processing functions including framing, FEC processing, rate matching, scrambling, modulation/demodulation, FFT/IFFT processing, reference-signal processing, and transmit/receive functions.
  • Develop and optimize C/C++ or equivalent implementations of L1 PHY and DSP processing functions for embedded and real-time modem systems.
  • Define and evaluate HW/SW partitioning of modem functions across programmable processors, DSP engines, FPGA/ASIC hardware accelerators, and embedded software.
  • Analyze and optimize modem processing across throughput, latency, computational complexity, memory bandwidth, data movement, and processor utilization.
  • Optimize multicore processing, memory organization, buffering, concurrency, and hardware-accelerator utilization for high-throughput L1 processing.
  • Work closely with modem algorithm engineers to translate communications and DSP algorithms into efficient production implementations.
  • Collaborate with ASIC, FPGA, firmware, BSP, and system engineering teams to define and integrate interfaces between L1 software and hardware accelerators.
  • Support pre-silicon verification, simulation, prototyping, system integration, and post-silicon validation.
  • Debug complex system-level issues spanning L1 software, DSP processing, hardware accelerators, firmware, and ASIC interfaces.
  • Evaluate modem architecture and implementation tradeoffs across performance, complexity, throughput, latency, memory, power, and hardware resources.
  • Provide technical guidance and contribute to L1 PHY, HW/SW partitioning, and modem implementation architecture decisions.

Minimum Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related technical discipline.
  • 10+ years of experience in L1 PHY software, modem implementation, DSP implementation, embedded communications software, or related areas.
  • Strong understanding of OFDM-based communication systems and major transmit and receive PHY processing chains.
  • Experience implementing or integrating L1 PHY processing on CPUs, DSPs, SoCs, FPGAs, ASIC accelerators, or heterogeneous processing architectures.
  • Strong understanding of HW/SW partitioning and hardware acceleration of computationally intensive modem functions.
  • Experience with performance profiling and optimization, multicore processing, memory management, and efficient data movement.
  • Experience working with interfaces between L1 software, embedded firmware, and custom hardware or hardware accelerators.
  • Ability to work across modem, DSP, ASIC, FPGA, firmware, BSP, and system engineering teams.

Preferred Qualifications

  • Master's degree or Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Communications, Signal Processing, or related field.
  • Deep experience with L1 PHY and modem implementation for wireless, cellular, satellite, or broadband communication systems.
  • Experience with FEC processing including LDPC, Turbo, or Polar coding, rate matching, and LLR processing.
  • Experience with FFT/IFFT processing, modulation/demodulation, MIMO, beamforming, or other computationally intensive PHY functions.
  • Familiarity with synchronization, carrier and sampling frequency offset compensation, timing recovery, channel estimation, equalization, and SNR estimation from implementation and integration perspective.
  • Experience with SIMD/vector processing, multicore optimization, DSP processors, or other high-performance embedded computing architectures.
  • Experience with fixed-point implementation and translation of floating-point DSP algorithms into production implementations.
  • Experience with MATLAB, Python, or equivalent environments for simulation, analysis, and implementation validation.
  • Experience with embedded real-time operating systems, BSPs, device drivers, or SoC initialization.
  • Experience with pre-silicon simulation, FPGA prototyping, hardware emulation, or post-silicon modem bring-up and validation.
  • Experience with satellite or non-terrestrial communication systems.
  • Familiarity with 3GPP PHY specifications and modern broadband wireless communication systems.