Experienced Embedded Software Engineer

Experienced Software Engineer with an understanding of digital and analogue electronics.

We are currently looking for a full-time Embedded Software Engineer to join our team.

EMP Designs is an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) company specialising in the design, development and manufacture of products requiring innovative electronic design. Our unique offering comes in the form of clever electronic circuit design paired with intelligent embedded software. Our solutions vary in scale from designing one-off prototypes to large volumes.

In our purpose-built research and development facility, we have all the equipment needed to develop new technologies to produce leading edge solutions to our client's brief. As part of a small team, you will be involved in the whole design process from start to finish allowing freedom for design innovation as well as having the opportunity to take responsibility for design developments and decisions.

The requirements of the projects we get involved in are varied. From custom lighting sequences to scientific measurement systems to the control of large moving platforms; no two projects are the same and we pride ourselves on being able to produce solutions for any electronic or software-based design problem.

Key Skills Required:

• Embedded C on bare-metal and RTOS targets (interrupts, DMA, peripheral drivers)

• Datasheet and reference-manual literacy: register-level work, not reliant on vendor HALs

• RTOS: FreeRTOS preferred

• Microcontroller experience with at least one of: PIC18/PIC32, nRF52/53/54, ESP32, STM32, RP2040/RP2350

• Comms peripherals: UART, SPI, I²C, USB

• Reading schematics and PCB layouts for board bring-up and fault-finding

• Hardware debugging: oscilloscopes, logic analysers (protocol decoders), SWD/JTAG debug probes

• Soldering and SMD rework

• Component selection: evaluating and choosing MCUs, ICs and modules against cost, availability and lifecycle

• Product specification: helping define products, both the technical requirements and the concept/feature ideas

• Version control: Git (Azure DevOps Repos)

• CI pipelines for firmware release images

• AI-assisted development: familiarity with agentic AI coding tools, Claude preferred

• Technical communication: clear written and verbal communication, including specs, documentation and design reviews

• Client communication: supporting clients directly, giving project updates and answering technical queries

Desirable Skills and Experience:

• Lighting control protocols: DMX512/RDM; Art-Net/sACN a plus

• Bootloaders and field firmware updates: A/B images, image verification

• Embedded cryptography: firmware signing and verification (ECDSA/Ed25519, SHA-256), encryption (AES), TLS (mbedTLS or similar), hardware crypto accelerators, secure key storage and provisioning

• Ethernet/TCP-IP: lwIP or similar; Ethernet PHY/switch bring-up

• Wireless/RF: BLE, CRMX/wireless DMX, LoRa

• USB Power Delivery: PD controllers, sink/source negotiation

• Product security and the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA): secure boot, SBOMs, vulnerability handling

• EMC/compliance awareness: how firmware affects EMC and RED testing

• Python scripting: test scripts, production programming, bench automation

• KiCad: schematic and layout familiarity

Benefits:

• Free parking

• Lunch provided

• 33 days holiday including Bank Holidays

• Pension

• 0-10% annual bonus based on company performance