Director, Silicon Verification
Level inferred from job title
Job description
Director of Silicon Verification at Graphcore, leading a multi-site verification organisation and defining verification strategy, methodologies and sign-off for complex high-performance AI accelerators. The role reports to the Senior Director of Verification and partners with Architecture, Logical Design, Physical Design, DFT, Systems and Program Management teams.
At a glance
- Employment
- Full-time
- Work mode
- Remote · Bristol
What you'll do
- Define the long-term vision, roadmap and strategy for silicon functional verification across all Graphcore silicon programs.
- Build, lead, and develop a high performing, globally distributed verification organisation.
- Establish scalable methodologies, leading edge verification techniques, and best practice processes.
- Drive automation, tooling and infrastructure evolution to improve productivity and verification quality.
- Evaluate emerging tools and technologies and drive adoption to deliver competitive advantage.
- Own verification planning, execution and sign off for all RTL blocks and top-level SoCs.
- Oversee definition of test plans including functional coverage targets; drive close through prioritisation of test content and coverage signoff; iterate plans to close verification gaps.
- Direct debugging strategies, triage processes and root-cause analysis workflows to enhance team productivity.
- Steer integration of verification technologies including formal methods, simulation acceleration/emulation and system level validation.
- Ensure high quality feedback to other functions within the Silicon Team.
- Partner with Architecture to influence and refine specifications for verifiability and risk reduction.
- Collaborate with Logical Design to align on design intent, architectural corner cases and test scenarios.
- Work closely with Physical Design and DFT teams to ensure coherent verification of interfaces, timing assumptions and test structures.
- Lead post-silicon debug alignment where needed, ensuring learning cycles feed back into RTL and verification methodology.
- Deliver verification sign off on schedule across multiple parallel projects.
- Guide program risk management, resource planning, milestone creation, and verification budgeting.
- Drive consistent metrics-based verification management (structural and functional coverage, bug funnels, simulation performance, CI health, etc.).
- Provide scheduled reports into program management on progress with associated metrics based collaterol.
What we're looking for
- Demonstrated ability to lead, scale and inspire high performing verification teams.
- Extensive verification leadership experience within CPU, GPU, ASIC or SoC environments.
- Deep understanding of modern verification methodologies, flows, and infrastructure.
- Strong capability in SystemVerilog, Python, C++ and Linux-based workflows.
- Expertise in diagnosing complex logic issues across RTL, testbench and system level domains.
- Strong communication, collaboration and stakeholder management skills across global sites.
Nice to have
- UVM and advanced SystemVerilog Assertions (SVA).
- Experience with assembly languages and compiler toolchains (LLVM, GCC).
- Knowledge of DVCS tools (e.g., Git).
- Familiarity with distributed compute systems (SGE or other DRMS).
- Experience with XML, XPath/XSLT.
- Web technologies such as HTML/DOM, JavaScript, SQL.
- Exposure to emulation, FPGA prototyping, or formal verification tools.
Your team
Verification team (Silicon Design organisation)
The Verification team sits within the Silicon Design organisation. We ensure that the RTL delivered by Logical Design and used by Physical Design team implements Graphcore's architectural needs and meets the company's quality standards.
Benefits
- Competitive salary
- Flexible working
- Generous annual leave policy
- Private medical insurance and health cash plan
- Dental plan
- Pension (matched up to 5%)
- Life assurance and income protection
- Generous parental leave policy
- Employee assistance programme (health, mental wellbeing, and bereavement support)
- Range of healthy food and snacks at the central Bristol office and own barista bar
Apply
Direct apply at Graphcore
Opens the job posting at Graphcore
About Graphcore
Building the future of AI compute
Graphcore is a team of semiconductor, software and AI experts, with deep experience in creating the complete AI compute stack - from silicon and software to infrastructure at datacenter scale. As part of the SoftBank Group, backed by significant long-term investment, we are delivering key technology into the fast-growing SoftBank AI ecosystem.
Mission
We're building the future of AI compute.
Key facts
- Semiconductors and AI compute
- Part of the SoftBank Group
- Backed by significant long-term investment
- Delivering key technology into the fast-growing SoftBank AI ecosystem
- Expanding its teams around the world
- Central Bristol office with healthy food, snacks and a barista bar
Partners & customers
What they value
- Committed to building an inclusive work environment
- Equal opportunity process
- Flexible approach to interview and reasonable adjustments