Module Test Instrumentation & Automation Engineer

About TP

The Motion Sensing Hardware team at Apple develops sophisticated test systems and automation frameworks that support cutting-edge sensing technologies in consumer products. This role offers an opportunity to join a team that characterizes and validates inertial, pressure, and magnetic sensing systems, delivering rigorous test coverage and data insights throughout the product development lifecycle. We invite motivated and innovative hardware engineers to help build the test infrastructure and domain expertise that puts our products in a class of their own...

Your Responsibilities

As a Module Test Instrumentation & Automation Engineer, you will be responsible for designing and executing test methodologies for IMU, pressure, and compass sensor systems, while closely supporting the team's data collection and automation infrastructure. Your work will span sensor characterization, test fixture development, signal analysis, and the development of software tools that give the team deeper insight into sensor behavior across the full product development cycle. You will apply deep sensor domain knowledge to transform raw measurement data into actionable characterization results, driving quality and performance from early silicon bring-up through mass production.

Required Skills

This position requires strong hands-on experience with inertial measurement units, barometric pressure sensors, and magnetometers, combined with solid software engineering skills and a rigorous approach to sensor characterization. You will own the design and execution of sensor characterization experiments, develop and maintain test plans for new sensor variants, and write the software needed to collect, structure, and analyze test data, integrating these tools into the team's shared automation infrastructure. The role demands strong software development skills alongside rigorous experimental methodology, the ability to diagnose sensor anomalies at the signal level, and excellent communication skills to translate hardware behavior into robust software solutions that the broader team can rely on.

Qualifications

• Education: BS and a minimum of 10 years relevant industry experience
• Experience: 5+ years of hands-on experience characterizing or testing inertial, pressure, or magnetic sensors in a product development environment
• IMU Fundamentals: Deep understanding of IMU fundamentals: accelerometer and gyroscope error models, noise characterization, temperature calibration and Allan deviation analysis
• Magnetometer Characterization: Hands-on experience with magnetometer characterization including magnetic interference assessment and heading accuracy validation
• Pressure Sensors: Experience characterizing barometric and differential pressure sensors including sensitivity, offset, hysteresis, and environmental stability
• Programming: Proficiency in Python or equivalent languages for writing production-quality test automation, data processing and analysis tools
• Lab Instrumentation: Proficiency with lab instrumentation: environmental chambers, rate tables, vibration fixtures, precision voltage references and data acquisition systems
• Signal Processing: Strong signal processing fundamentals: FFT, filtering, noise floor analysis, and statistical characterization of sensor outputs
• Software Design: Strong object-oriented software design skills: ability to write reusable, well-structured code that integrates cleanly into shared team frameworks
• Communication: Excellent written and verbal English communication skills, with the ability to document test methodologies clearly and present characterization results to hardware and systems teams

Preferred Qualifications

• Education: Bachelor's Degree in Electrical, Mechanical, Mechatronic, or Aerospace Engineering
• Simulation Environments: Experience developing simulation environments or digital twins of sensor systems that allow performance to be evaluated without physical hardware
• Sensor Fusion: Experience with sensor fusion algorithms combining IMU, magnetometer, and pressure data (e.g., AHRS, altitude estimation, dead reckoning)
• Modeling Techniques: Familiarity with stochastic sensor modeling techniques including Kalman filtering, Monte Carlo simulation and uncertainty quantification
• Communication Protocols: Familiarity with hardware communication protocols used in sensor integration (I2C, SPI, UART) and ability to read and interpret register-level sensor data
• Collaboration: Experience working alongside firmware or embedded software engineers to debug sensor data pipelines at the hardware-software boundary
• Data Analysis: Familiarity with AI/ML-based data analysis techniques applied to sensor characterization datasets, including anomaly detection and performance prediction
• Test Frameworks: Experience with automated test frameworks and data pipeline tools used in production hardware testing environments
• MEMS Fundamentals: Knowledge of MEMS fabrication fundamentals and how process variation influences sensor performance
• Consumer Electronics: Experience with consumer electronics product development cycles, including EVT/DVT/PVT test phases
• Motion Sensing Technologies: Familiarity with motion sensing technologies across multiple modalities and their interaction effects in integrated consumer devices
• Passion: Passion for rigorous measurement science and continuous improvement of test methodology