Intel
Senior CPU Performance Architect
$191K–$361K
US, Texas, Austin +4 · Senior · Full-time · Posted Mar 19, 2026
- Location
- US, Texas, Austin
US, Oregon, Hillsboro
US, California, Folsom
US, California, Santa Clara
US, Arizona, Phoenix - Experience
- Master's degree with 10+ years of experience, or PhD with 6+ years of experience; both paths require the stated CPU performance team experience. Also requires 8+ years of continuous cycle-accurate C++ simulator work.
- Education
- Master's degree, or PhD with dissertation within a general CPU performance domain.
About the job
Defines CPU microarchitecture and performance specifications, models performance and power, and resolves design and performance bottlenecks from architecture through silicon.
What you'll do
- Develop and evaluate CPU microarchitectures and end-to-end specifications.
- Model CPU performance and power, analyze workloads, and identify bottlenecks.
- Collaborate with engineering teams and debug performance differences between models, RTL, and silicon.
What they ask for
- Master's degree with 10+ years of experience, or PhD with a dissertation in a general CPU performance domain and 6+ years of experience on a high-performance, high-frequency ARM or x86 CPU performance team.
- 8+ years of continuous work with cycle-accurate C++ CPU performance simulators.
- Experience designing high-performance CPUs and expertise in at least one CPU domain, such as branch prediction, fetch/decode, execution, or memory subsystem.
- Experience debugging microarchitecture and simulation issues; strong microarchitecture, RTL, or logic development background.
Nice to have
- Experience with microarchitecture exploration, performance modeling, and CPU performance work through real silicon.
- Advanced C++/STL and scripting skills; ability to write assembly, craft tests, and debug RTL performance issues.
Pay
$190,610.00-361,480.00 USD (target compensation; posting does not specify base salary or total pay)
Tools
ARM, x86, C++, STL, RTL
Model-written summary · the original posting is authoritative