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Featured Jobs
Senior Process Engineer
From lab data to demonstration plant: you’ll be shaping how it really works. A well-funded UK process technology business is scaling up novel CO₂ utilisation technology from lab development through pilot and demonstration scale. This next phase is critical and needs an experienced process engineer who enjoys translating data into robust, operable process designs and being close enough to the...
Wolviston Management Services
Enslow
FPGA Design Engineer
FPGA Design Engineer Contract: 6 months, Inside IR35, Bradford, 3 days on-site Rate: £60 per hour Project Scope FPGA design for a safety-critical, high-reliability system, covering concept through to verification and system integration. The work focuses on real-time data handling and close interaction with embedded software and hardware teams. Technical Scope FPGA design using VHDL (Verilog/SystemVerilog advantageous) Development of control...
Vantage Consulting
Bradford
Manufacturing Process Engineer
You'll be conducting reviews of all manufacturing processes within a complex aerospace manufacturing operation Identify risks to safety, quality and operational efficiency is your first task before updating work instructions and procedural documentation Operational areas you'll be looking at include CNC machining, chemical processes, fork lift operations and working at height You need experience in reviewing processes within an engineering...
ATP Technical Limited
Uxbridge
Wastewater Process Engineer
Framework: AMP8 (2025–2030) Delivery Model: Build-Only construction & commissioning Locations: Manchester | Liverpool | Warrington | Preston | Blackburn | Chester Delivery Environment This role ensures that process design intent survives construction reality. You’ll support wastewater assets through build, commissioning, and early operation, resolving performance issues before handover. This is a practical process role, not modelling or optioneering. Day-to-Day Responsibilities...
Mercury Hampton Ltd
Warrington
Process Engineering Team Lead
Process Engineering Team Lead Our client is a global engineering and technology organisation with a UK-based R&D and engineering centre in the Hampshire area, supporting the development of advanced heat exchanger solutions for High Tech and Green Tech applications. The business works closely with customers in sectors including data centres, heat pumps, and hydrogen technologies, delivering innovative, sustainable products to...
Gi Group
Fareham
Fpga Design Engineer
FPGA Engineer Job – Southampton Job Reference: FPGA Engineer Location: Southampton, UK An experienced FPGA Engineer is required to join a specialist engineering team in Southampton, supporting the design, development, and enhancement of FPGA and SoC solutions for high-reliability products. The FPGA Engineer role offers hands-on technical ownership across the full FPGA lifecycle. Key responsibilities (FPGA Engineer): Design, implement, and...
The semiconductor industry lies at the heart of modern technology. From smartphones and data centres to autonomous vehicles, medical devices and defence systems, semiconductors power the digital age. The UK is investing heavily in semiconductor research, fabrication and talent development as part of its industrial strategy — yet employers continue to report a persistent problem:
Many graduates are not job-ready for semiconductor roles.
Despite strong academic programmes in engineering, physics and materials science, there remains a tangible skills gap between what universities teach and what semiconductor employers actually need.
This article explores that gap in depth: what universities do well, where there are consistent shortfalls, why the divide persists, what employers genuinely want, and how jobseekers can bridge the gap to build successful careers in the semiconductor sector.
Semiconductors sit behind almost everything: smartphones, EVs, medical devices, aerospace systems, telecoms networks, cloud data centres & the AI boom. In the UK, the semiconductor ecosystem spans chip design, IP, photonics, compound semiconductors, testing, packaging, equipment, supply chain & R&D. That breadth creates real opportunities for career switchers in their 30s, 40s & 50s, especially if you target roles where experience, process discipline & delivery skills matter as much as deep device physics.
This article gives you a UK reality check: what semiconductor jobs actually look like, which roles are realistic for career switchers, what skills employers value, how long retraining tends to take & whether age is a barrier.
Semiconductors sit at the heart of modern technology. From consumer electronics and automotive systems to AI, defence, telecoms and advanced manufacturing, semiconductor professionals play a critical role in designing, fabricating and testing the components that power the global economy.
Yet many employers struggle to attract the right candidates. Semiconductor job adverts often receive either very few applications or a high volume of unsuitable ones. Experienced engineers and scientists frequently ignore adverts that feel vague, generic or disconnected from the realities of semiconductor development and manufacturing.
In most cases, the issue is not a shortage of talent — it is the clarity and quality of the job advert.
Semiconductor professionals are detail-oriented, process-driven and highly selective. A poorly written job ad signals weak technical understanding and unclear expectations. A well-written one signals credibility, precision and long-term intent.
This guide explains how to write a semiconductor job ad that attracts the right people, improves applicant quality and strengthens your employer brand.
If you are aiming for semiconductor jobs in the UK it is easy to assume you need a PhD level maths toolkit. In practice most roles do not. Whether you are targeting device engineering, process engineering, yield engineering, product engineering, test, reliability, RF, analogue, digital design, EDA, packaging or applications engineering, the maths you actually use clusters into a few workhorse areas.
This guide strips it back to the topics that genuinely help you get hired & perform well on the job:
Exponents, logs & “physics curves” (Arrhenius style behaviour, subthreshold, leakage)
Calculus in plain English (rates, gradients, differential equations intuition)
Device electrostatics & transport basics (Poisson equation intuition, drift & diffusion)
Complex numbers for AC & RF (impedance, phasors, frequency response)
Signals maths (Fourier intuition, bandwidth, noise density)
Probability & statistics for manufacturing (SPC, DOE, yield models, reliability basics)
Basic optimisation habits (fitting models, tuning trade-offs, making decisions with data)
You will also get a 6 week plan, portfolio projects & a resources section you can follow without getting pulled into unnecessary theory.
Semiconductors sit quietly at the heart of everything: phones, cars, medical devices, satellites, data centres & everyday appliances. Behind every chip are people designing circuits, running fabs, testing wafers, modelling devices & solving problems most users never see.
Those people are not all “textbook” engineers – & that’s a good thing.
If you’re neurodivergent (for example living with ADHD, autism or dyslexia), you may have been told your brain is “too distracted”, “too literal” or “too disorganised” for a high-precision, high-reliability industry. In reality, many of the traits that made school or traditional offices hard can be huge strengths in semiconductor work: intense focus on detail, pattern-spotting in test data, creative thinking around yield & process issues.
This guide is written for semiconductor job seekers in the UK. We’ll cover:
What neurodiversity means in a semiconductor context
How ADHD, autism & dyslexia strengths map to chip & fab roles
Workplace adjustments you can ask for under UK law
How to talk about your neurodivergence in applications & interviews
By the end, you should have a clearer sense of where you might thrive in the semiconductor industry – & how to turn “different thinking” into a genuine career advantage.
As we move into 2026, the semiconductor jobs market is in that awkward phase of being both overheated and cautious.
Global chip demand is booming again, driven by AI, data centres, automotive, defence, 5G and consumer electronics. Fab capacity is set to hit record highs as new plants come online worldwide.
At the same time, we are seeing:
Waves of investment and hiring in some regions and companies.
Restructuring and layoffs in others, as firms rebalance portfolios and chase AI margins.
A deepening global skills shortage, with forecasts of major shortfalls in engineers and technicians by 2030.
For the UK, the sector is small but strategically vital. The National Semiconductor Strategy, public funding and participation in European chip programmes are all aimed at building domestic capability in design, compound semiconductors and advanced manufacturing.
So what does all this mean for semiconductor jobs in 2026 – and for employers trying to recruit in a brutally competitive market?
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