This interview was held with Mayank Varshney, VP of Engineering, Mirafra Inc.
Please share with us a bird’s eye view about Mirafra Software Technologies?
Mirafra Software Technologies is possibly the largest Standalone Design Services company from India. Mirafra started couple of decades ago with a vision of providing Premium Design Services for Indian Semiconductor Ecosystem with 50% of our Engineers in the first few years hired from the prestigious IIT (Indian Institutes of Technology) background.
Even today, our founders Alok Kuchlous and Shyam Padala passionately drive the company with the same vision and culture of standing out in Innovation and efficiency in each of our Design & Software Projects.
Mirafra’s Software Team derives its root from our belief that Contemporary Technology Industry is as much about Software & Hardware co-optimization as it is about these fields individually. Our Software Business Unit thus caters to cutting edge domains like Embedded Software, Application Software, Digital Transformation, AI & Machine Learning Technologies
Tell me a bit about your background? How did you first get started with Mirafra?
My passion for Technology started with MS in Electronics & Semiconductor Research from UC Riverside (and previously AMU, India) where I was a student member of the student wing of the prestigious SRC (Semiconductor Research Corporation).
My industry experience covered multiple domains of the Chip design like Memory Design in Mosys and enabling Digital and Mixed Signal Design Solutions in Cadence. I worked for Foundry (Intel Foundry Services IFS) and various Design teams in Intel before joining Mirafra in the year 2019. Thus, I am blessed with a holistic breadth of the Chip Design industry from Memory, EDA, Foundry and Design perspective.
Currently I am heading the US wing of Mirafra, called Mirafra Inc which is headquartered in Texas with good presence in California and few other states in US as well
What is your vision for the future of technology industry?
Technology Industry is undergoing a major Left-shift today with anything that was being done manually is moving towards Automation or AI. Whether its Driverless cars or EVs, or if its Big Data on Cloud; whether its Industrial Automation or 5G; chatGPT for Natural language processing or Machine Learning literally taking any and every decision for us in realtime; technology is reinventing itself everywhere.
What problem did you see that needed to be fixed? What is your approach to solving that?
Tech Industry is famously driven by 30-70 rule which mean 30% of engineers do 70% of the work. This is because most companies keep their product at the forefront with engineers as the means to achieve it.
We believe in focusing on career growth for our engineers through the opportunities that we provide. So, every engineer is encouraged to have a career goal for themselves, and we together continuously strive to achieve it through our projects.
How has the role/offering of Mirafra changed during the recent years?
Mirafra’s horizon has grown with the rapid growth of the Design & Technology Industry. We have tripled in size over last decade and grown our portfolio from Architecture/Spec to Silicon handoff. Our software BU has grown from Embedded Software to Tech centric Application development and added a Digital Transformation Services (DTS) wing to focus on AI & Machine learning.
Which market segment seems promising to you? And why?
We are very intrigued by how the tremendous growth in Data & AI revolution is expanding the Technology business. There is a massive expansion and unwavering demand for Data Centers, and this has further scaled up with AI workloads requiring countless GPUs and NPUs. The demand is everywhere as Data is the center of the change of various industries like Finance, Automotive, F&B, Retail, Healthcare etc.
Who is a typical customer for Mirafra?
Mirafra has traditionally worked with most large Chip design houses in Consumer Electronics, Servers, Networking, Automotive etc domains but has been growing customer base in Mid-size and Startup Ecosystem as well.
In the last decade, several Software companies have jumped in Hardware and our Software wing has also expanded to Embedded Software, AI, ML and Data Engineering space, there by expanding our horizons with the rapidly expanding Technology Industry
Are you currently hiring? What type of jobs?
We have been hiring in multiple geographies across US, India and Europe. Typical job roles have been in Design, Verification, Validation, Embedded Software, AI/ML and Data Science & Engineering.
What is your #1 advice for people who want to work for your company?
When you join Mirafra, come with a belief that you are working on technologies that are shaping up the future of the industry. Be passionate about the work you do and invest in learning.
Where can one find more information?
You can find out more about us at http://www.mirafra.com/
What is the best moment in your day?
I interview several candidates almost every day. My best moment is when I find someone excited to learn and passionate about Technology and specially when I learn something from the discussion.
How do you keep yourself energized and engaged during the day?
Exercise is an important part of my daily routine. After any difficult time of the day, I like to exercise a little to restart my mind as I strongly believe exercise, like meditation, allows you to drop the baggage and lightens you up.
What is your preferred lunch discussion topic?
Technology in short-term and long-term horizons
How do you spend your time outside working hours?
Apart from work, I meet lots of friends and spend a valuable part of my day with my son.
