Principal Embedded Software Engineer
Panthalassa · Portland, OR
$210,000–$290,000from the description
Jul 6, 2026
Portland, OR
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A principal-level embedded software role at a marine renewable energy hardware company, focused on owning the full firmware stack — from bare-metal drivers and embedded Linux to OTA fleet updates — for an autonomous ocean-deployed device that must run unattended for years. The work spans close collaboration with electrical engineers during hardware bring-up, architecture ownership, CI/CD and testing standards, and mentoring a growing embedded team. Best suited to a seasoned engineer equally comfortable reading schematics and writing systems-level code.
Principal level · 10+ years · Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA · Full-time
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
Posted 2 times — it's one opening, so apply once.
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 5 people in the Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (software developers). range 1–8
Applicant volume Light — Few people clear these requirements, so an application that does clear them gets looked at. Worth applying to even if you miss a nice-to-have.
Rare in this occupation — lead with these, and say what you built with them.
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $159,430 (middle half $128,996–$177,877). 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 JD explicitly calls out Rust as a 'strong plus' even within the required qualifications section, but the section also accepts C/C++ as the primary systems language gate — Rust is captured as the primary skill with C/C++ as alternatives, reflecting that the requirement is for a systems language with Rust strongly preferred.
Yocto and Buildroot are listed as interchangeable options for embedded Linux distro experience in the required section; Yocto is named first.
JTAG and SWD are listed together as debugging interfaces; treated as interchangeable alternatives for the same hardware debugging requirement.
Secure boot and embedded security (encrypted comms, key management) appear only under Desired Qualifications, along with marine/harsh-environment hardware and safety-critical systems experience (aerospace, autonomous vehicles, medical devices, industrial controls) — all marked preferred.
The 5+ years with mission-critical/safety-critical systems is a desired-qualifications experience gate, not a hard requirement; it is not emitted as a skill since it names no specific technology.
This role is on-site in Portland, OR; relocation assistance is offered but no remote option is mentioned.
Read the full posting
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