Gain essential insights into the San Francisco ASIC design talent market with our H2 2025 report.
This report explores how demand is evolving across the Bay Area semiconductor ecosystem, highlighting the market forces, hiring pressures and skill shortages shaping ASIC design hiring in one of the world’s most competitive chip hubs.
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ASIC Design (San Francisco) H2 2025 Talent Report
Alex Ford
12th Jan 2026
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Key Highlights
- Market Trends: The ASIC design market in H2 2025 remains strong, driven by continued investment in AI, high-performance computing and advanced networking. Record valuations, major acquisitions and manufacturing expansion have reinforced the strategic importance of custom silicon, with San Francisco remaining central to this activity.
- Talent Supply: The supply of elite ASIC engineers remains constrained. Layoffs at legacy players, most notably Intel, have released some talent into the market, but shortages at senior level persist. Deep expertise in RTL design, verification and advanced nodes continues to be scarce.
- Hiring Impact: Competition for experienced engineers is intense, particularly for those with end-to-end ownership of complex chip programs. M&A activity has created some uncertainty, but demand remains high. Looking ahead, growth in Space and Defense is expected to further increase demand for ASIC and FPGA talent.
- Insight: ASIC design remains a highly defensible skill set. As AI, compute and national security priorities converge, access to top-tier silicon talent will continue to be a key differentiator.