System Power Engineer, Consumer Devices

OpenAI OpenAI · AI Frontier · San Francisco, CA · Consumer Products

Seeking a System Power Engineer to characterize, measure, and optimize power consumption on embedded hardware products for AI-powered consumer devices. This role involves building power test automation, measuring subsystem power usage, and driving improvements in battery life, thermal behavior, charging performance, and system reliability. The engineer will collaborate with Electrical Engineering and system software teams to establish methodologies and metrics for power efficiency.

What you'd actually do

  1. Define and develop power testing automation to evaluate system behavior across a range of workloads and operating conditions.
  2. Measure subsystem-level power consumption using power breakout probes and other lab instrumentation.
  3. Develop and execute power characterization tests spanning basic workloads, complex mixed-use scenarios, and representative day-of-use experiences.
  4. Partner closely with Electrical Engineers to identify opportunities to improve system power efficiency.
  5. Collaborate with software engineering teams to optimize energy usage in scenarios that impact battery life, device temperature, charging performance, and overall user experience.

Skills

Required

  • Experience measuring and optimizing power consumption on embedded hardware platforms.
  • Demonstrated experience designing and operating complex hardware-in-the-loop laboratories and orchestrating device testing at scale.
  • Experience analyzing power profiles and correlating them with overall system performance.
  • Experience collaborating cross-functionally with Electrical Engineering, embedded software, systems, and product teams.
  • Experience defining repeatable power benchmarks and launch readiness metrics for hardware products.
  • Strong proficiency in Python.

Nice to have

  • Familiarity with statistics, experimentation methodologies, or data science concepts.
  • Experience performing subsystem-level power measurements using power breakout probes or similar lab instrumentation.
  • Experience working with battery-powered consumer products and optimizing for battery life, thermals, and charging performance.

What the JD emphasized

  • power consumption
  • power test automation
  • embedded hardware platforms
  • power instrumentation
  • power profiles
  • system behavior
  • subsystem-level power usage
  • battery life
  • thermal behavior
  • charging performance
  • system reliability
  • power efficiency
  • power characterization tests
  • power benchmarks
  • measurement methodologies