I saw a very popular question on the Internet: 2023, what is the current employment situation of FPGA? Many students are also interested in this direction, so let’s find out together.
What are the FPGA jobs?
From the perspective of chip design process, FPGA positions can be divided into four categories
Product development period: FPGA system architect
Chip design period: digital IC design engineer, FPGA development engineer
Chip tape-out period: FPGA verification engineer
Product maintenance period: FAE engineer
FPGA is used in : communication field, complex digital signal processing, video image processing, high-speed interface field, artificial intelligence, IC verification and other fields.
From an industry point of view, fpga was mainly used in video processing and communication in the past. In recent years, with the rise of 5G, autonomous driving, AI and big data technologies, FPGAs have ushered in new development opportunities.
FPGA has advantages in processing efficiency and flexibility in the field of AI. In the future, with the development of AI technology, it will usher in new growth, including many categories, such as robots, language recognition, image recognition, natural language processing and expert systems. At the same time, how to improve the programmability of FPGA has always been the focus of industry research.
Programmability here refers to both the flexibility of the hardware and the ease of use at the software level. Therefore, the architecture of the FPGA is constantly being refurbished and upgraded.
Judging from the current situation, if you want to talk about salary or employment opportunities, FPGA is too specialized and expensive, and its application fields are not wide. General military units or scientific research institutes, such places that are not sensitive to cost, use FPGA more. Of course, there are also many companies specializing in FPGA-related products.
FPGA design compared to IC design
To put it in a small way, it depends on which position you choose. After all, which point you want to enter the industry as your ticket is also very important.
Speaking of growing up, if you go further in the future and become a big boss, you must be involved in basically all directions.
Different directions mean that you are going to develop in two different companies. There is not much difference in development prospects, because you will eventually become a big boss. At present, the salary of IC design is a little higher than that of FPGA.
How about the digital IC design track in the direction of FPGA?
To put it bluntly, FPGA has two purposes, one is called particle, and the part type is called prototype verification. What does this mean? I am going to make a chip today. For example, I want to run a marathon, but I may not have a marathon venue right now. I may find a playground to practice my hands first.
Of course, the playground may be limited, so FPGA can't predict the actual situation of my final chip, but it doesn't matter. I can put my design on the FPGA first, put it on the playground and run around first, and take a look at my design. Whether it is logic or my basic functions, of course it will definitely run slowly at this time. So see if it can be functionally autonomous, or some design principles are autonomous.
This is the first direction called part type, a verification verification. The second direction is the FPGA-based digital design just mentioned, without real tape out, I might say that my design may be revised frequently, just like software. At this time, I may implement my design on FPGA, and I don't need to run fast.
In this case, I need to put my design on the FPGA. What are the benefits or prospects of this situation? Assuming you have mastered the design process or ideas of your entire team now, can you start a business? I have my seniors, including theirs, who have similar experiences. Of course he is sure It is a professional ethics not to destroy the products of the original company. So I think it is not bad based on the direction of FPGA. Especially for those who may want to start a business in the future, in fact, you don't need a big track.
A big company like Huawei doesn't have to be afraid of big competitors coming in. But for you, for example, if you form a small team, three or four people, and take down the entire market, you may share the 10 million possible profits equally with a few people, which is quite good for you, so this direction is also good.
Now the threshold for entering FPGA is not low, and the threshold for some companies to do FPGA is almost on the same level as ASIC. Therefore, everyone must learn more about external recruitment, understand the current employment threshold, and salary, and consider more in combination with their future development trends. Before entering the industry, you can also go to engineers to learn more about the market.
Here is an entry: IC entry to understand