Dinesh's User Story

Hi,

I'm Dinesh, currently pursuing my Ph.D. in Microelectronics and VLSI at IIT Hyderabad.

My journey into research hardware engineering has been one of persistence, problem-solving, and purpose. From the start, I’ve been driven by a simple question: how can we build intelligent hardware systems that are not only powerful but also practical and reusable? Whether it’s real-time decision-making in constrained environments or supporting the ever-growing demands of AI, my focus has always been on designing hardware that can go the distance—and take others along with it.

I’ve been fortunate to work with teams at AMD, SoC Labs and Arm ECS Research Centre, where I contributed to projects aimed at making AI hardware more efficient and adaptable. The work has been rewarding, but not without its hurdles. There were times when weeks of effort led to silence on the board. When debugging revealed more questions than answers. When tools failed, and documentation ran out. But those moments taught me resilience—and the value of building systems that others can understand, extend, and trust.

Through it all, one theme kept returning: reusability. I realized that the true impact of our work as hardware engineers lies not just in performance benchmarks, but in how accessible and shareable our designs are. Can someone pick up this SoC platform and adapt it to their use case? Can we create tools and flows that others can build on without starting from scratch? These are the questions I’ve tried to answer through my research and collaborations.

Sharing became as important as building. I documented what I learned, created internal guides, and helped set up structures that would outlive any single project. I’ve seen firsthand how that mindset can multiply impact—both within teams and across institutions. 

That’s why I was deeply inspired when I connected with John Darlington, one of the visionaries behind the Research Hardware Engineering (RHE) Community. Just as Simon Hettrick helped spark the global Research Software Engineering movement, John has been instrumental in initiating a space for hardware researchers to come together—to share our challenges, our tools, and our wins.

I believe this community is exactly what our field needs. A place where hardware engineers aren’t isolated, but supported. Where reusable platforms are celebrated. Where it’s okay to talk about synthesis issues, integration nightmares, or the joy of finally seeing everything just… work.

The RHE Community is still in its early days, and that’s what makes it exciting. It’s an invitation—to collaborate, contribute, and build something lasting together.

I hope you’ll join us. There’s real power in shared knowledge, and real progress in shared effort.