FPGA Internship (Summer 2025)

Optiver FPGA Engineers create solutions with nanosecond response times, highly-parallelized algorithms, and customized low-level networking that help the firm deploy successful trading strategies across the world’s largest financial markets. Our engineers are tightly integrated with our business so that we can solve challenges effectively and efficiently; we deeply understand the business problem before developing the solution.

WHO WE ARE:

At Optiver, our mission is to improve the market by injecting liquidity, providing accurate pricing, increasing transparency and acting as a stabilising force no matter the market conditions. With a focus on continuous improvement, we play an active role in the safeguarding of healthy and efficient markets for all participants. We tackle the toughest problems, challenge the status quo and always aim for excellence. As one of the largest market making institutions, we are a trusted partner on 70+ exchanges across the globe.

Our Amsterdam office is where it all began. Since our founding in 1986, Optiver’s Amsterdam office has developed into one of the most dynamic and exciting trading floors in Europe. Our culture reflects the Dutch capital city’s progressive, innovative and inclusive nature. With its unique spirit, Amsterdam is the ideal hub for our teams to trade a wide range of products, from listed derivatives to cash equities, ETFs, bonds and foreign exchange.

WHAT YOU’LL DO:

Get ready for eight weeks immersed in the fast-paced, dynamic world of market making. As Optiver’s FPGA Engineer Intern, you'll fully own projects that directly impact Optiver's world-class trading systems. You will experience tight feedback loops and ship your code to production alongside our senior Engineers and Traders. You’ll work side-by-side with your mentor to build latency-critical applications, parallel systems and networking interfaces, giving you a chance to make a direct impact on a leading trading firm, while launching your career in engineering. You’ll tackle real issues that will test your critical thinking and problem-solving acumen, and each day will bring new challenges that require fresh perspectives. It's an unrivalled opportunity to accelerate your knowledge and make your mark on Optiver's business.

You will also have the chance to join industry lectures to learn about trading and our other departments to gain a complete understanding of Optiver and our business. Don't worry, you won't be expected to have previous knowledge of the financial industry! You'll be educated and upskilled by our world-class trainers in order to hit the ground running.

Examples of potential projects that you could be working on:

• Supporting new networking protocols – think 25G and 100G interfaces
• Developing applications in close collaboration with our Traders to improve our trading strategies and success rates – where did that nanosecond go?
• Improve the resource usage of our current systems – why use 8 bits when 3 will do?
• Make your mark on our future trading systems by trailblazing new domain areas – from high-precision timestamping to new proprietary inter-system communication protocols

WHO YOU ARE:

• Student working toward a Master's degree in Electrical/Electronic Engineering, Computer Engineering or similar, with the ability to work full-time upon graduation in 2026
• Someone with strong engineering instincts and academic experience in digital design with FPGAs or ASICs
• Experienced in writing hardware in VHDL, Verilog or SystemVerilog
• Passionate for clean code, simple well-architected systems and continuous improvement, with a desire to understand how the systems you build fit into our trading activities
• Able to collaborate with developers, traders and business operations

WHAT YOU’LL GET:

• An 8 week internship (Summer: July-August) working alongside best-in-class professionals from over 40 different countries
• Highly competitive compensation package
• Optiver-covered travel to Amsterdam and a fully furnished apartment in the city center
• Awesome social events and outings
• A range of benefits including free breakfast, lunch and dinner, bi-weekly massages, a bicycle to explore Amsterdam and much more
• Most importantly, the possibility to receive a full-time offer upon completion of internship

HOW TO APPLY:

Are you interested in furthering your career on one of the most dynamic and exciting trading floors in Europe?

Apply directly via the form below for the position of Software Engineer Intern. Please provide us with a CV and letter of motivation in English. Unfortunately we cannot accept applications via email for data protection reasons.

If your application is selected to proceed to the next round, you will be required to complete online assessments. By submitting your application you are confirming that you will be able to take the assessment within 14 days.

Kindly note that we do not require any assistance from third-parties including agencies in the recruitment of this role. If you have any questions feel free to contact our Recruitment team via [email protected].

*We accept one application per role, per year, across all office locations. If you have applied to this role across any of our offices in the last year and have been unsuccessful, you can reapply once your 8 month cooling period has concluded. Please note: If you reapply before the end of your cooling period, this will be considered your most recent unsuccessful application. For applicants based in India, our entry route is via the placement office internship hiring season (July/August).

DIVERSITY STATEMENT:

As an intentionally flat organisation, we believe that great ideas and impact can come from everyone. We are passionate about empowering individuals and creating diverse teams that thrive. Every person at Optiver should feel included, valued and respected, because we believe our best work is done together.

Our commitment to diversity and inclusion is hardwired through every stage of our hiring process. We encourage applications from candidates from any and all backgrounds, and we welcome requests for reasonable accommodations during the process to ensure that you can best demonstrate your abilities. Please let us know if you would like to request any reasonable adjustments by contacting the Recruitment team via [email protected].

More information on how Optiver Europe processes your personal data can be found in our [Privacy Policy*](https://lead5194.s3.amazonaws.com/content/uploads/files/document/180525_Website_Privacy_Policy.pdf?mtime=20180604094750). *

We encourage applications from candidates from any and all backgrounds, and we welcome requests for reasonable adjustments during the process to ensure that you can best demonstrate your abilities. Please let us know if you would like to request any reasonable adjustments by contacting the Recruitment team via [email protected].

For answers to some of our most frequently asked questions, refer to our Campus FAQs.