System Software Engineer - Linux Kernel and Device Drivers at MatX
Mountain View, CA
$250,000–$475,000from the description
Jul 10, 2026
Mountain View, CA
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A systems software engineering role focused on building and owning the Linux kernel driver stack for custom AI accelerator chips, covering PCIe device drivers, DMA, interrupt handling, and low-level userspace libraries. The work spans early hardware bring-up on simulation and FPGA platforms through to production, with shared ownership of adjacent components like chip initialization daemons and platform telemetry. Suits experienced engineers comfortable working directly from hardware specs and register maps with limited guidance.
Senior level · 8+ years · San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA · Full-time
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Roughly 120 people in the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (software developers). range 25–180
Applicant volume Moderate — A normal amount of company. The rare requirements below are what will separate a shortlisted application from the rest.
Rare in this occupation — lead with these, and say what you built with them.
What the occupation pays Median $217,796 (middle half $177,469–$231,052). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (6)
The posting lists three compensation bands (Early, Mid, Senior Career) without specifying which applies to this role. The Senior Career band ($250,000–$475,000) is shown as the ceiling; the actual offer will depend on the candidate's level. All three bands include equity.
The title 'System Software Engineer' carries no explicit seniority level, so advertised seniority is Unspecified. However, the 8+ years requirement and the depth of ownership described (blank-page driver development, first-silicon bring-up, architecture influence) firmly support a Senior classification.
A BS in CS/EE is listed under 'Who You Are' but is immediately qualified by 'or equivalent practical experience', so no formal degree is hard-gated.
The role is hybrid (Mountain View office Tues–Thurs), not fully remote. Monday and Friday are remote days.
Pre-silicon validation environments (simulation, emulation, FPGA), first-silicon bring-up, SR-IOV/dma-buf/VFIO, kernel profiling tools (perf, ftrace, eBPF), BMC/OpenBMC interaction, and Rust all appear under the explicit 'Bonus Points' section.
Ignored 1 non-technology phrase(s) as skills (responsibilities/concepts, not named tools): Linux kernel development.
Read the full posting
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