Low-Level Systems Engineer

Embedded Firmware & Systems Software — Connected Pet Wearable

Company: Waggi Connected Pets | Type: Full-time, permanent | Location: Flexible / remote-friendly

Waggi is building the intelligence layer for modern pet care — a premium, low-power connected wearable that tracks a dog's location, activity, movement, sleep and wellbeing, and turns it into AI-driven insight for owners, partners and enterprise platforms. Waggi isn't just a tracker: it combines on-device processing, multi-radio connectivity and a cloud-native AWS platform to deliver real-time and historical insight, reliably, for months on a single charge. We are an early-stage startup, small team, fast decisions, real ownership. The person we hire here won't inherit a rigid process; they'll help create it and shape the technical foundations of the company as we scale.

We're hiring a low-level systems engineer to own everything that runs on our device — the firmware and systems software that turn a multi-radio, sensor-packed wearable into a reliable, intelligent product. This is a deeply technical, close-to-the-metal role: RTOS and drivers, memory and concurrency, connectivity stacks, power-aware state machines, secure over-the-air updates, and on-device ML. You'll work hand-in-hand with our electrical engineer on board bring-up and own software quality from prototype to the field.

• Core silicon: Nordic nRF9151 cellular IoT SiP (Arm Cortex-M33) as the primary SoC/modem, plus an Espressif ESP32 for Wi-Fi and BLE.
• Connectivity: LTE-M and NB-IoT cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and assisted GNSS — all in a compact wearable form factor.
• Sensing: accelerometer, gyroscope and temperature, feeding on-device (edge) ML for activity, movement and behaviour classification.
• Cloud: firmware talking MQTT and low-power UDP to a cloud-native AWS backend (AWS IoT Core, DynamoDB), with secure provisioning and OTA updates.
• Operation: designed for long battery life and reliable operation across standard tracking, live tracking, low-power standby and Lost Dog modes.

• Own the firmware and low-level software across the device — RTOS/bare-metal application code, drivers, and board-support work on Nordic nRF (Zephyr) and Espressif ESP32 (ESP-IDF).
• Work close to the metal: memory management, concurrency, scheduling, interrupts, bootloaders and robust, low-overhead system design on constrained hardware.
• Build a power-aware architecture: a state machine spanning standard, live, low-power standby and Lost Dog modes, tuned for predictable, minimal power draw.
• Own multi-radio connectivity in software — cellular (LTE-M/NB-IoT), BLE, Wi-Fi and GNSS — with resilient behaviour on flaky, low-bandwidth links.
• Deliver device-to-cloud communication: MQTT and low-power UDP to our AWS IoT backend, secure device provisioning, and a reliable OTA update system.
• Build the on-device data path: sensor drivers, sensor fusion, and embedded (edge) ML pipelines for activity and behaviour classification.
• Own device security: secure boot, provisioning and encrypted communication.
• Partner closely with the electrical engineer on bring-up and hardware debug, and build the tooling, tests and CI that keep firmware reliable at scale.

Essential

• A strong low-level / systems software background: expert in C/C++ , working close to hardware — drivers, RTOS or OS internals, memory, concurrency and interrupts.
• Firmware experience on constrained microcontrollers (Arm Cortex-M) with an RTOS such as Zephyr or FreeRTOS — or a strong systems background with genuine embedded appetite and some hands-on exposure.
• Solid understanding of networking and protocols (TCP/UDP, MQTT), ideally over constrained or low-power links.
• Real awareness of low-power design — sleep states, duty cycling and the software side of battery life.
• Strong debugging skills with JTAG/SWD, logic analysers and scopes — comfortable at the hardware/software boundary.
• Thrives in a startup: comfortable with ambiguity, shifting priorities and owning outcomes end to end.

Nice to Have

• Direct experience with our exact stack — Nordic nRF Connect SDK / Zephyr and/or Espressif ESP-IDF.
• Experience with cellular IoT (LTE-M/NB-IoT), BLE and GNSS integration.
• TinyML or embedded ML experience — running inference on-device for activity or motion classification.
• Secure boot, provisioning and embedded security experience; bootloader and OTA design.
• Experience integrating devices with cloud IoT backends, especially AWS IoT Core / MQTT.
• Prior startup or founding-team experience, and any exposure to wearables, consumer IoT or the pet space.

• In the first few months: you're deep in the firmware, shipping improvements, and trusted to own the embedded software roadmap.
• Within the first year: firmware is more reliable across every operational mode, battery life is better, and OTA updates are something we ship with confidence.
• Beyond that: you've laid the software foundations — tooling, tests and architecture — the product scales on.

This role is location-flexible and remote-friendly, with occasional travel to Ireland for bring-up, testing and team sessions. Compensation is competitive for a senior, foundational hire and includes meaningful equity — and there is real room to grow into a technical leadership role as the company scales. We're happy to discuss specifics early in the conversation.

To apply or ask questions, contact [email protected]. We read every application from a real person.