Microsoft
Principal Quantum Systems Architect
$166K–$331K
Redmond, WA · On-site · Principal · Full-time · Posted Jun 26, 2026
- Experience
- 6+ years with a doctorate, 10+ years with a master's degree, or 12+ years with a bachelor's degree in industry or research and development; equivalent experience is also accepted.
- Education
- Doctorate, master's degree, or bachelor's degree in Physics, Engineering, or related field, or equivalent experience.
About the job
Defines the architecture of scalable classical control and readout systems for large-scale quantum computing, guiding system design, validation, and integration across hardware and software.
What you'll do
- Define control and readout architecture across room-temperature and cryogenic domains, including compute platforms, communications, synchronization, and dataflow.
- Establish system partitioning and hardware/firmware/software co-design strategies for control, measurement, and feedback workloads.
- Lead system-level trade-offs and guide platform evolution toward scalable, production-ready quantum systems.
What they ask for
- Doctorate in Physics, Engineering, or related field and 6+ years of industry or research and development experience; or Master's degree and 10+ years; or Bachelor's degree and 12+ years; or equivalent experience.
- Meet Microsoft, customer, and/or government security screening requirements, including the Microsoft Cloud Background Check.
- Provide proof of citizenship, U.S. permanent residency, or other protected status for export-control eligibility assessment.
- Familiarity with basic AI tools and ability to work in an AI-first environment using modern AI tools.
Nice to have
- Experience designing complex compute or signal-processing architectures and driving architectural trade-offs.
- Experience with RF signal processing, quantum control/readout, FPGA/ASIC technologies, cryogenic computing, or scalable systems.
Pay
USD $165,600 - $296,400 per year (base salary); USD $220,800 - $331,200 per year (base salary)
Tools
Office CoPilot, GitHub CoPilot, Chat GPT, FPGA, ASIC
AI focus
Use modern AI tools to accelerate discovery through hardware and software development; familiarity with basic AI tools is required.
Model-written summary · the original posting is authoritative