Job Description
Position Description:
This position provides senior electrical engineering leadership for the design, development, and qualification of power conversion electronics used in Battery Back Up (BBU) and Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) systems within Data Center environments. Scope includes Battery Management System (BMS) hardware, bidirectional DC-to-DC conversion, charging and discharging circuitry, protection architecture, voltage/current/temperature sensing, and communications interfaces. This role also owns the technical evaluation and benchmarking of commercial BBU electronics to inform build-versus-buy decisions. Deliver high-quality engineering support to internal teams and customers with a solution-oriented approach.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities:
● Serve as the senior electrical design authority for power conversion electronics in Battery Back Up and UPS platforms, from architecture definition through production release.
● Design and analyze bidirectional DC-to-DC converters (buck/boost, half-bridge, dual active bridge, LLC/phase-shifted full-bridge), including topology selection, magnetics specification, and control-loop compensation.
● Develop charging and discharging circuitry for Li-ion, LiFePO4, and lead-acid strings, including CC/CV charge stages, pre-charge and inrush control, soft-start, and balancing hardware.
● Define and design the protection architecture: overvoltage, undervoltage, overcurrent, short-circuit, reverse-polarity, and overtemperature protection, along with contactor/FET disconnect, fusing, and fail-safe behavior.
● Design BMS hardware including analog front ends (AFE), fuel-gauge and cell-monitoring ICs, isolation barriers, and cell-voltage, pack-current, and temperature sensing chains; specify accuracy, calibration, and drift budgets.
● Design and validate communications interfaces (CAN/CAN-FD, I2C, SPI, UART, RS-485, Modbus, SMBus) between BMS, chargers, converters, and system controllers.
● Own schematic capture, component selection, and PCB layout direction for high-current and high-voltage power stages, with attention to thermal management, creepage/clearance, EMI/EMC, and derating.
● Perform worst-case, efficiency, thermal, magnetics, and reliability analyses (including MTBF and FMEA) and drive design decisions from the results.
● Evaluate, benchmark, and qualify commercial off-the-shelf BBU electronics and third-party power modules; document performance, risk, and cost findings to support build-versus-buy recommendations.
● Bring up, test, and debug proto@types using oscilloscopes, power analyzers, electronic loads, battery cyclers, thermal imaging, and current probes; develop and execute design verification and validation test plans.
● Partner closely with firmware engineers on control algorithms, telemetry, fault handling, and hardware/firmware integration for BMS and power conversion.
● Support product safety and regulatory qualification (UL, IEC, UN 38.3) and coordinate with test labs, quality, and compliance teams through certification.
● Manage supplier and contract-manufacturer technical relationships, including design reviews, component qualification, and second-source strategy.
● Document requirements, design specifications, analyses, and test results; lead design reviews and provide technical mentorship to junior engineers.
Skills and Requirements
Education and Experience:
● Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or a related field; Master's degree preferred.
● Highly independent go-getter who thrives on working on new challenges
● 8+ years of power electronics hardware design experience, including direct experience with battery backup, UPS, energy storage, or DC-DC power conversion products.
● Demonstrated design ownership of switch-mode power converters, including bidirectional DC-to-DC conversion, from concept through production.
● Hands-on experience designing battery charging and discharging circuitry and BMS hardware for Li-ion, LiFePO4, or lead-acid chemistries.
● Strong working knowledge of protection architecture and fail-safe design for high-energy battery systems, including disconnect devices, fusing, and fault detection.
● Experience designing precision sensing circuits for cell voltage, pack current (shunt and Hall-effect), and temperature, including isolation and accuracy budgeting.
● Proficiency with analog and digital control loop design, compensation, and stability analysis for power converters.
● Experience with communication protocols such as CAN/CAN-FD, I2C, SPI, UART, RS-485, and Modbus in power system applications.
● Proficiency with schematic capture and PCB design tools (e.g., Altium, OrCAD, KiCad) and circuit simulation tools (SPICE, PLECS, or similar).
● Strong laboratory skills with oscilloscopes, power analyzers, electronic loads, battery cyclers, and thermal measurement equipment.
● Working knowledge of EMI/EMC design and mitigation techniques for switching power supplies.
Preferred Qualifications:
● Experience with UL 1973, UL 9540, UL 1778, IEC 62619, IEC 62040, or UN 38.3 battery and UPS safety standards.
● Familiarity with functional safety standards (IEC 61508, ISO 26262) as applied to power electronics.
● Experience with battery AFE, cell-monitoring, and fuel-gauge ICs (e.g., Texas Instruments BQ series, Analog Devices, NXP).
● Experience with wide-bandgap devices (SiC, GaN) and high-frequency converter design.
● Exposure to power factor correction (PFC) front ends and DC-AC inverter design for UPS applications.
● Experience with data center, telecommunications, industrial, or military power system requirements.
● Experience evaluating and integrating third-party or contract-manufactured power electronics assemblies.
● Professional Engineer (PE) license or equivalent advanced credential.
We are a company committed to creating diverse and inclusive environments where people can bring their full, authentic selves to work every day. We are an equal employment opportunity/affirmative action employer that believes everyone matters. Qualified candidates will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, marital status, national origin, ancestry, genetic factors, age, disability, protected veteran status, military or uniformed service member status, or any other status or characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations, and ordinances. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request to HR@insightglobal.com.
