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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Verification Planning Analyst

💰 $ - $

EngineeringVerificationPlanningASICSoC

🎯 Role Definition

The Verification Planning Analyst is a cross-functional contributor who develops, coordinates, and tracks verification plans and schedules for complex hardware and software projects (ASIC/SoC/FPGA/firmware). This role ensures verification scope, resources, and metrics align with product milestones, drives regression and coverage strategy, and communicates verification status and risks to engineering and program management. The analyst partners closely with Design Verification (DV) engineers, architects, program managers, and tool/automation teams to enable timely sign-off and product readiness.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Junior Verification Engineer / DV Engineer
  • Test Planning Coordinator / QA Analyst
  • Systems Validation or Release Engineer

Advancement To:

  • Senior Verification Planning Analyst
  • Verification Program Manager
  • Verification Manager / DV Manager

Lateral Moves:

  • Systems Validation Engineer
  • Release or Test Engineering Manager
  • Product Program Manager

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Develop and maintain comprehensive verification plans that map product requirements to verification scope, verification environments (simulation, emulation, FPGA prototyping), verification IP, and test vectors for ASIC/SoC projects.
  • Create and manage verification schedules and milestone plans, integrating input from DV teams, software/firmware, system validation, and program management to meet tape-out and product release dates.
  • Define measurable verification success criteria and sign-off checklists (functional coverage goals, assertion coverage, regression pass/fail conditions, bug closure targets) and drive adherence across teams.
  • Coordinate allocation of verification resources (engineers, lab assets, compute/emulation capacity) and track utilization, forecasting capacity shortfalls and recommending mitigation strategies.
  • Own regression strategy and execution planning: identify regression suites, prioritize smoke/regression/testbench runs, schedule nightly/weekly regressions, and manage queue/prioritization policies.
  • Establish and maintain verification metrics dashboards (coverage trends, regression health, escape rates, average time-to-fix, open defect aging) and produce weekly/monthly status reports for program reviews and executive stakeholders.
  • Conduct risk assessments based on verification progress, coverage gaps, and defect trends; escalate high-impact risks and propose concrete contingency and mitigation plans.
  • Collaborate with verification leads and architects to translate high-level verification plans into actionable test plans, test cases, and coverage constructs (functional, code, assertion, and block-level coverage).
  • Drive requirements traceability by mapping product-level requirements to verification tests and coverage points, ensuring traceability for audits and sign-off.
  • Lead verification planning reviews, cadence meetings, and cross-team syncs (DV, design, architecture, firmware, system validation) to align on scope, priorities, and resource commitments.
  • Support automation and CI pipelines for verification regressions (Jenkins, Buildkite, internal CI), including job scheduling, result collection, and triage workflows to reduce manual overhead and accelerate feedback.
  • Maintain and curate verification artifacts and documentation: verification plans, test matrices, coverage models, regression runbooks, and sign-off checklists.
  • Coordinate with tool and infrastructure teams to ensure simulation, emulation, and prototyping platforms are provisioned and instrumented for required coverage measurement and regression throughput.
  • Triage verification blockers and test failures by working with DV engineers, design owners, and software/firmware teams to isolate root causes and prioritize fixes or workarounds.
  • Drive improvement initiatives for verification efficiency and quality: identify bottlenecks, recommend process changes (regression slimming, resource pooling), and implement best practices across projects.
  • Manage defect tracking and verification backlog processes (JIRA, Bugzilla), including triage ownership, severity classification, and tracking defect resolution toward verification sign-off.
  • Synthesize verification health and readiness briefings for program milestones (alpha, beta, sign-off), highlighting coverage shortfalls, open critical issues, and go/no-go recommendations.
  • Support requirements and verification audits by providing evidence of coverage closure, regression results, and defect remediation history for compliance or customer reviews.
  • Mentor and onboard junior verification planners and coordinators, sharing best practices for planning, metrics management, and stakeholder communication.
  • Coordinate cross-release verification dependencies (IP re-use, third-party IP integration, software stacks) and orchestrate joint verification activities to validate system-level behavior.
  • Maintain up-to-date knowledge of verification methodologies (UVM, SystemVerilog, assertion-based verification) and industry tools (simulators, coverage tools, emulators) to drive informed planning decisions.
  • Participate in post-mortem and lessons-learned reviews to improve future verification planning, scheduling accuracy, and resource forecasting.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
  • Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
  • Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.
  • Assist in creating templates and standardized artifacts for verification plans and reporting.
  • Help maintain verification tool license inventories and coordinate with procurement on capacity planning.
  • Support cross-functional training sessions to improve verification awareness across design and firmware teams.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Strong understanding of verification methodologies (UVM, SystemVerilog) and how verification planning maps to testbench architecture and coverage goals.
  • Practical familiarity with verification flows and tools: simulators (VCS, Questa), coverage tools, emulators (ZeBu, Palladium), and FPGA prototyping platforms.
  • Hands-on experience with verification metrics and coverage analysis (functional coverage, code/statement/branch coverage, assertion coverage) and using coverage reports to drive planning decisions.
  • Experience with regression orchestration and CI systems (Jenkins, GitLab CI/CircleCI or internal frameworks) and queuing/prioritization of large regression farms.
  • Proficiency in scripting for automation and data analysis (Python, Perl, Tcl, or Bash) to parse logs, extract metrics, and automate report generation.
  • Familiarity with version control (Git, Perforce) and defect tracking/project management tools (JIRA, Rally, TestRail).
  • Strong spreadsheet, dashboarding, and data visualization capability (Excel, Power BI, Tableau) to present verification health and trends to stakeholders.
  • Ability to create and maintain requirement-to-test traceability matrices and manage verification artifacts for audit and sign-off.
  • Knowledge of emulation/prototyping capacity planning and hardware/software co-verification considerations in SoC projects.
  • Experience working with cross-functional teams (design, software, system validation) and translating technical constraints into schedule and resource plans.
  • Understanding of RTL design and common verification failure modes to better triage and prioritize verification work.
  • Familiarity with Agile and Scrum practices applied to hardware verification programs.

Soft Skills

  • Excellent stakeholder communication: ability to synthesize technical verification status into clear executive summaries and actionable next steps.
  • Strong organizational and project management skills with attention to detail and the ability to manage multiple concurrent verification streams.
  • Analytical mindset with a data-driven approach to problem solving and decision-making.
  • Proactive risk identification and escalation skills; comfortable making trade-off recommendations under schedule pressure.
  • Collaborative team player who can work across engineering, program management, and tools teams.
  • Coaching and mentoring skills to grow junior planners and verification engineers.
  • Adaptability to changing priorities in fast-paced product development cycles.
  • Strong written documentation skills for creating verification plans, reports, and runbooks.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or equivalent technical discipline.

Preferred Education:

  • Master's degree in Electrical/Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field.
  • Certifications or coursework in project management, data analysis, or verification methodologies.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Electrical Engineering
  • Computer Engineering
  • Computer Science
  • Systems Engineering

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 3–7 years of relevant experience in verification planning, coordination, or design verification roles within semiconductor, SoC, or embedded product teams.

Preferred:

  • 5+ years of hands-on experience supporting verification planning on complex SoC/ASIC projects, with demonstrable success delivering verification plans, managing regressions, and driving sign-off.
  • Proven experience with verification tools, coverage analysis, and CI/regression orchestration in large-scale verification environments.
  • Prior experience in a cross-functional program or release management role, interacting with engineering managers and executive stakeholders.
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