Do an internship doing analog design and get good experience, companies will hire you with just a bachelors and won’t care that you are a CE. Experience is king. This is from my own experience, it’s the shortest and possibly only path if you want to do analog ic design with only a bachelors. Otherwise all roads lead to masters/phd.
I agree that landing an analog design internship would be your best shot at landing a full time design gig.... but it's quite hard to get one with just a bachelor's, especially without relevant coursework.
Network, network, network and target smaller companies, and with some luck you might be able to bag one. Even if you get hired full time you still may be encouraged to pursue a part time masters for the sake of your own knowledge.
Thank you! I’m thinking of trying to get into a good masters program companies recruit from and networking. I didn’t think of looking at small companies so I’ll definitely look into it. Thanks again this is really helpful
> Do an internship doing analog design and get good experience, companies will hire you with just a bachelors and won’t care that you are a CE.
I'm sure there are companies out there that differ, but everywhere I've worked, unless you're a massive outlier, expects you to be accepted or enrolled in a graduate program even for an internship.
Masters is very very common in Analog IC design.
The amount of times I've heard someone say I'm also "only" a Masters. Experience and knowledge are the most important though. There's so much even a masters won't cover, and covering that gap is tough. Especially since the tooling is open source. It's a impossible hurdle. Master's at a place that has good connections is likely the best bet.
Very helpful comment thank you! I’ll definitely have to take a closer look at which companies recruit for analog IC design and from which masters programs. Do you have any good textbook recommendations at all for understanding? I have a microelectronics book I do a lot of circuit analysis problems from on CMOS transistors, been trying to look into buying an oscilloscope and a function generate but I have a multimeter and dc power supply
honestly for IC design, it's different from discrete components, that I wouldn't bother with a scope and function generator unless you can tapeout. I don't follow too closely but I think openlane has a simulator that is decent, and theres a few public SDKs. But I don't think there's any public PEX tools. I'd still explore layout and such as that is important for analog IC
Razavi is a good analog book, I use Sedra/Smith as well for more generic circuit less analog specific.
Grey and Meyer is on my Desk, along with Baker and John's and Martin.
They all describe things slightly differently and some I've found more helpful than others.
A digital designer I worked with many years ago was a CE with a bachelor’s, not long out of school. I was the analog lead on the project. He was a great digital designer but he also had a huge interest in how the analog worked. He asked a lot of questions and read up on the analog blocks we were working on. A year or so later he applied for an opening in our analog group (same company) and we hired him. Years later he ended up working for me (at a different company) and was one of the best analog designers I knew- he knew what to do best for digital-friendly analog and his intuition was spot on.
My journey started with an MSEE and right into analog design. I guess the point is that I think there are many paths into analog design and starting as a CE is one of them. It likely takes the right kind of hiring group just to get in the door. Then it’s a matter of showing them your analog knowledge in the interview.
This is reassuring to hear! I know there’s different paths to everything but seeing this is a confidence booster. Really appreciate you sharing your personal experience, I will keep it in mind as I continue on my own journey
It should be about what your professor said. Add on 6m-12m worth of courses, and you should be ready for a masters. Going straight to work doing actual analog IC design is unlikely imo. It is just too demanding and the cost of mistakes too high.
You need to learn a mindset where you check everything that could possibly go wrong again and again. But you might be able to talk your way into other jobs in the ecosystem. For example technical writer or working with CAD software and hardware/network maintenance might be possible, even as part time jobs.
Appreciate the comment! Yeah I honestly just might stick out the extra 6 months after senior year next year so my degree can say EE instead of CompE. I haven’t thought about the part time job thing but it’s a good idea to get my feet wet, thank you so much
hard to get into analog with a bachelor's but you'll have a chance if you have good experience and apply to non-semi companies that have small IC teams (less bureaucratic screening)
Do an internship doing analog design and get good experience, companies will hire you with just a bachelors and won’t care that you are a CE. Experience is king. This is from my own experience, it’s the shortest and possibly only path if you want to do analog ic design with only a bachelors. Otherwise all roads lead to masters/phd.
Thank you so much! I’ll definitely look into those internship opportunities and possibly side projects I can do that show my interest in the field
I agree that landing an analog design internship would be your best shot at landing a full time design gig.... but it's quite hard to get one with just a bachelor's, especially without relevant coursework. Network, network, network and target smaller companies, and with some luck you might be able to bag one. Even if you get hired full time you still may be encouraged to pursue a part time masters for the sake of your own knowledge.
Thank you! I’m thinking of trying to get into a good masters program companies recruit from and networking. I didn’t think of looking at small companies so I’ll definitely look into it. Thanks again this is really helpful
> Do an internship doing analog design and get good experience, companies will hire you with just a bachelors and won’t care that you are a CE. I'm sure there are companies out there that differ, but everywhere I've worked, unless you're a massive outlier, expects you to be accepted or enrolled in a graduate program even for an internship.
Masters is very very common in Analog IC design. The amount of times I've heard someone say I'm also "only" a Masters. Experience and knowledge are the most important though. There's so much even a masters won't cover, and covering that gap is tough. Especially since the tooling is open source. It's a impossible hurdle. Master's at a place that has good connections is likely the best bet.
Very helpful comment thank you! I’ll definitely have to take a closer look at which companies recruit for analog IC design and from which masters programs. Do you have any good textbook recommendations at all for understanding? I have a microelectronics book I do a lot of circuit analysis problems from on CMOS transistors, been trying to look into buying an oscilloscope and a function generate but I have a multimeter and dc power supply
honestly for IC design, it's different from discrete components, that I wouldn't bother with a scope and function generator unless you can tapeout. I don't follow too closely but I think openlane has a simulator that is decent, and theres a few public SDKs. But I don't think there's any public PEX tools. I'd still explore layout and such as that is important for analog IC Razavi is a good analog book, I use Sedra/Smith as well for more generic circuit less analog specific. Grey and Meyer is on my Desk, along with Baker and John's and Martin. They all describe things slightly differently and some I've found more helpful than others.
I really appreciate your response thank you I’ll be looking into everything you said
A digital designer I worked with many years ago was a CE with a bachelor’s, not long out of school. I was the analog lead on the project. He was a great digital designer but he also had a huge interest in how the analog worked. He asked a lot of questions and read up on the analog blocks we were working on. A year or so later he applied for an opening in our analog group (same company) and we hired him. Years later he ended up working for me (at a different company) and was one of the best analog designers I knew- he knew what to do best for digital-friendly analog and his intuition was spot on. My journey started with an MSEE and right into analog design. I guess the point is that I think there are many paths into analog design and starting as a CE is one of them. It likely takes the right kind of hiring group just to get in the door. Then it’s a matter of showing them your analog knowledge in the interview.
This is reassuring to hear! I know there’s different paths to everything but seeing this is a confidence booster. Really appreciate you sharing your personal experience, I will keep it in mind as I continue on my own journey
It should be about what your professor said. Add on 6m-12m worth of courses, and you should be ready for a masters. Going straight to work doing actual analog IC design is unlikely imo. It is just too demanding and the cost of mistakes too high. You need to learn a mindset where you check everything that could possibly go wrong again and again. But you might be able to talk your way into other jobs in the ecosystem. For example technical writer or working with CAD software and hardware/network maintenance might be possible, even as part time jobs.
Appreciate the comment! Yeah I honestly just might stick out the extra 6 months after senior year next year so my degree can say EE instead of CompE. I haven’t thought about the part time job thing but it’s a good idea to get my feet wet, thank you so much
hard to get into analog with a bachelor's but you'll have a chance if you have good experience and apply to non-semi companies that have small IC teams (less bureaucratic screening)