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# Principal Systems Architect

- **Company:** Spectrum IT Recruitment
- **Location:** Chilworth, UK
- **Salary:** £100,000.0 - £110,000.0
- **Contract:** Permanent contract
- **Skills:** LTE (Telecommunication), C++ (Programming Language), Modems, Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), Hardware Design, Python (Programming Language), MATLAB, Signal Processing, Systems Architecture, Application Specific Integrated Circuits, 5G NR, Hardware Acceleration
- **Published:** October 31, 2026
- **Apply:** https://www.adzuna.co.uk/jobs/details/5946832078

## About the Role

* Extensive experience in system architecture and development of complex signal-processing, modem or communications products
 * Proven ability to define, analyse and manage complex system and product requirements
 * Strong experience in hardware/software partitioning, interface definition and architectural design
 * Ability to lead technical trade-offs across software and hardware implementation approaches
 * Demonstrable technical leadership across multidisciplinary engineering teams
 * Significant customer-facing experience, including technical studies, solution evaluation and product or IP integration
 * Knowledge of 3GPP standards, including 5G NR or significant 4G LTE experience
 * Strong communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical concepts clearly to engineering and commercial stakeholders
 * Desirable: experience developing complex IP for FPGA or ASIC implementation
 * Desirable: experience taking products from FPGA-based designs towards ASIC deployment
 * Desirable: experience in ASIC development, hardware acceleration and digital signal processing
 * Desirable: experience with fixed-point design, modelling and implementation
 * Desirable: proficiency in MATLAB, Python and C++
 * Desirable: contributions to product roadmaps, technology strategy and long-term architectural planning
 * Desirable: experience mentoring senior engineers or architects and improving engineering practices

## Description

* Lead architectural development across complex products and IP, maintaining alignment between customer requirements, product strategy and engineering delivery
 * Define system architectures, including hardware/software partitioning, interfaces and implementation approaches
 * Lead architectural and algorithm trade-offs across performance, throughput, latency, resource usage and power
 * Provide technical direction on requirements, system decomposition, architectural modelling, performance analysis and verification strategy
 * Guide implementation decisions across software, FPGA and ASIC platforms
 * Lead customer technical discussions, feasibility studies and integration activities
 * Resolve complex engineering issues and maintain architectural consistency across products and teams
 * Mentor engineers and architects, contributing to technical standards and long-term technology planning

Technologies:

 * Architect
 * FPGA
 * Hardware
 * Matlab
 * Python