Firmware Controls Engineer

Welcome To The Traegerhood: 

Our business is BBQ, and business tastes good. Traeger invented the wood pellet grill over 30 years ago, and we’ve been revolutionizing outdoor cooking ever since. We’re a team of disruptors, innovators, problem solvers, and food fanatics who are dedicated to bringing people together to create a more flavorful world. From our headquarters in Salt Lake City and beyond, we work tirelessly to provide a world-class experience to our customers, retailers, and especially our employees. If you’re a team player who’s dedicated to delivering top-quality results every day, then we want you to come cook with us!

 

As an Firmware Controls Engineer at Traeger, you will design, develop, and implement control systems and embedded software that deliver precise, consistent cooking performance in our products. Your primary focus will be characterizing grill behavior including heat distribution, system response, and tuning PID control parameters to achieve exceptional cooking results. You will evaluate performance goals, address latency, and manage variations in the combustion process through a combination of hands-on physical testing and analytical modeling.

 

In this role, you will own and deliver control requirements that align with our culinary and customer expectations while meeting performance, reliability, and safety standards. Beyond control firmware, you will contribute to general embedded firmware development including building features and enhancements that improve grill performance and the user experience.

 

Success in this position requires strong analytical and problem-solving skills, creativity, and attention to detail, along with clear communication of findings and progress across hardware, firmware, performance, and product teams.

 

Responsibilities:

Engage on product development projects driven by user insights with expert understanding of core engineering skills from creation, commercialization, and validation.

• Design, develop, and implement tuning control systems for product lineup. 
• Develop and maintain control system specifications, test plans, and validation protocols. 
• Collaborate with product development teams to design control systems that meet the performance, reliability, safety, and regulatory requirements of the industry. 
• Help transfer market requirements into product requirements that may be decomposed accordingly to enable design.
• Collaborate with the test team, culinary, and design engineers to ensure everything is properly implemented and tested. 
• Perform hands-on testing and characterization using automated grill control hardware/software and data acquisition tools.
• Troubleshoot and resolve any control system issues or failures that arise during development, testing, or production. 
• Design and develop embedded systems from concept to implementation, ensuring they meet performance, cost, compliance, and reliability requirements.
• Develop and maintain technical documentation for control systems including, engineering drawings, specifications, and programming. 
• Design, manage, and maintain embedded firmware solutions.
• Create and manage engineering documentation that meets industry standards.
• Perform troubleshooting and root cause analysis on existing and future products.
• Work well with all stakeholders and understand the needs of the whole product team.
• Aid the team by identifying process gaps and working together on making process improvements.
• Travel internationally as required for product development and product launches (<5%).
• Support some after-hours teleconferences with international partners as needed.

 

Qualifications:

Successful candidates will typically have the following skill set:

• Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, computer engineering, computer science, or related technical field.
• 5+ years of experience designing and developing firmware including some experience with control systems for industrial equipment and/or appliances.
• Proficiency in programming languages such as C and C++. Python is a plus. 
• Strong understanding of RTOS based micro-controllers and micro-controller architecture.
• Experience with consumer IoT architecture and products utilizing WiFi and Bluetooth, a plus.
• Writing drivers for and/or utilizing various peripheral devices, sensors, and protocols such as UART, SPI, I2C, CAN, etc.
• Experience using Gitlab or similar for firmware revision control.
• Knowledge of reading and interpreting electrical schematics a plus.
• Experience with hardware bring-up and bench level .
• Strong knowledge of PC based data acquisition.
• Experience using test equipment (e.g. oscilloscopes, digital multi-meters, and data acquisition equipment like Dewesoft or similar).
• Experience with product development using a stage-gate process.
• Experience using JIRA for work assignments.
• Interaction with overseas resources, ability to travel overseas.
• Disciplined and experienced with data driven problem solving.
• Ability to analyze and process data to reach and communicate data-based recommendations.

• Initiative and a wide degree of creativity is required.
• Highly self-motivated and self-directed with the ability to work with teams cross functionally.
• Must have proven experience developing and designing products.
• Ability to effectively create and communicate ideas.
• PC literate in Microsoft applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Project).

Why You Will Love To Work Here:

• Be part of the most disruptive force in outdoor cooking
• Join a true team working towards a common goal
• Culture of risk-taking, innovation & quality
• Have an outdoor lover’s paradise in your backyard
• Full medical/dental/vision packages to fit your needs
• 401K to help you plan for the future
• Tuition reimbursement
• Individual professional development programs & initiatives to help you grow professionally
• Great discounts on all things Traeger