Embedded Engineer — Returning Term
- Returning to the Embedded Engineering team for a 4-month term before starting the MSc at Imperial.
- Continuing work on hardware-in-the-loop test infrastructure and embedded telematics systems.
- Current
- Embedded
- HIL
// embedded.systems.engineer //
William Hatcher
_
- currently @ Geotab
- Oakville, ON
- Queen's BEng '26 → Imperial MSc
Recent Computer Engineering graduate from Queen's University. Building reliable systems that combine embedded hardware, scalable software, and real-world sensing.
// 01 // about
whoami
I'm a recent Computer Engineering graduate of Queen's University (GPA 3.97, Dean's List), focused on embedded systems, scalable software, and hardware–software integration. During my degree I built Zephyr RTOS sensing platforms on Nordic nRF52 microcontrollers at Queen's ePOWER lab, and previously interned at Geotab designing multi-threaded TCP/IP communication software and deploying a 26-station hardware-in-the-loop testing infrastructure for embedded telematics devices — I'm now back at Geotab for a 4-month embedded engineering term.
In September 2026 I'll begin an MSc in Computing (Software Engineering) at Imperial College London, continuing to build systems that combine reliable software, embedded hardware, and real-world sensing. Alongside my degree I served as Co-President and Director of Competitive Esports at the Queen's Esports Association, leading operations for a 500+ member student organization.
0
cumulative GPA
0+
QEA members led
// 02 // experience
work.history
Undergraduate Research Assistant — Software Lead
- Built Zephyr RTOS firmware on Nordic nRF52 for a 9-sensor research lysimeter, scheduling periodic sampling and BLE telemetry through Zephyr work queues and kernel primitives.
- Designed a modular sensor HAL abstracting I²C and SAADC inputs behind calibrated unit conversions, so new sensor types could be added without touching the scheduling layer.
- Wrote a custom BLE GATT service for real-time telemetry — packed payloads, custom UUIDs, low-power periodic notifications.
- Owned sensor bring-up and field debugging: protocol timing, I²C edge cases, and analog drift, to keep the platform reliable outdoors.
- Zephyr RTOS
- BLE
- Embedded C
- Sensor Fusion
Embedded Engineering Intern — Quality & Test Automation
- Designed a multi-threaded TCP/IP serial protocol in C and Python to bridge a Linux embedded host with concurrent test clients — POSIX threads, semaphores, and mutexes coordinating thread-safe data handoff.
- Architected and deployed 26 HIL test stations (5 DUTs each, ~130 devices) that expanded test capacity 10×; each station fans out GPIO, CAN, ADC, and UART/serial through a Raspberry Pi.
- Built Pytest smoke suites wired into CI/CD so regressions on any hardware bus surfaced continuously instead of in batched test runs.
- Owned rig configuration end-to-end — hardware specs, IP reservations, capability flags — all version-controlled so a station's identity is reproducible.
- HIL
- Python
- CI/CD
- Embedded Linux
Teaching Assistant
- Taught C from fundamentals through pointers and dynamic memory in weekly office hours and lab sessions.
- Coached students through Linux OS labs — kernel modules, shell programming, pthreads producer/consumer synchronization, and /proc inspection.
- Provided live debugging support on the gnarly stuff: stack memory, race conditions, x86-64 system calls.
- C
- Linux
- Debugging
- Teaching
Co-President & Director of Competitive Esports
- Led executive operations for a 500+ member organization, reporting to and negotiating with university administration.
- Built and ran a 20-person leadership team — 10 Game Directors, 5 Marketing, 5 Community Coordinators.
- Owned the $10K annual budget across competitions, equipment, and campaigns; secured external sponsor funding to extend it further.
- Leadership
- Budget Management
- Events
// 03 // projects
build.log
> 01
Educational Satellite (ESAT) Platform
- Developed embedded firmware in C++ (Arduino framework) for a modular nanosatellite platform integrating OBC, ADCS, EPS, and RF communication subsystems.
- Implemented wireless command and telemetry communication over 433 MHz RF, enabling remote monitoring and control between the satellite and ground station.
- Integrated subsystem communication over I²C between flight computer and control subsystems, enabling coordinated telemetry collection and command execution.
- Built a high-frequency telemetry pipeline to collect sensor and subsystem data for machine learning–based anomaly detection, modifying firmware timing and packet scheduling to increase dataset resolution.
- Designed experiments and injected controlled faults into subsystem firmware to generate labeled datasets for training and evaluating anomaly detection models.
- Performed board bring-up, firmware flashing, and debugging across multiple microcontroller platforms (STM32L4, MSP430) and satellite subsystems.
- Embedded C++
- Arduino
- RF
- I²C
- ML
- STM32
> 02
Autonomous Taxi System
- Architected and implemented a finite-state machine (FSM) control system for autonomous navigation, handling lane following, stop/yield logic, and intersection maneuvers.
- Developed real-time embedded control software on Raspberry Pi integrating line sensors and camera input for lane tracking and navigation decisions.
- Implemented computer vision pipelines in OpenCV for lane detection and preprocessing of camera frames for traffic sign classification.
- Integrated TensorFlow Lite CNN models accelerated with Coral Edge TPU for low-latency traffic sign classification within constrained embedded compute budgets.
- Implemented dataset preprocessing and augmentation (rotation, scaling, brightness variation) to improve model robustness to lighting and viewpoint variation.
- Designed a modular robotics software architecture separating perception, decision logic, and control layers to support deterministic behavior and subsystem testing.
- Raspberry Pi 4
- PiCar-X
- Python
- OpenCV
- TF Lite
- Coral TPU
> 03
Anti-theft Package Security System
- Collaborated with a team to research, architect, and implement a smart anti-theft package security system utilizing Arduino microcontroller hardware and embedded C/C++ development.
- Solely responsible for developing firmware to interface with multiple hardware components, including an ultrasonic distance sensor (HC-SR04) for proximity detection, RFID module (ISO/IEC 14443) for secure activation, and a Wi-Fi-enabled IP camera for remote visual monitoring using ESP8266/ESP32 modules and MQTT.
- Integrated sensor data acquisition, interrupt-driven event handling, and real-time system control using I²C and SPI communication protocols on the Arduino platform.
- Designed secure, low-latency wireless communication workflows for alert notifications and remote system access, leveraging TCP/IP stack over Wi-Fi.
- Delivered a comprehensive technical presentation, earning a finish in the top 5% of the class cohort.
- Arduino
- Embedded C
- IoT
- MQTT
> 04
Interactive IV Insertion Simulator
- Collaborated in a multidisciplinary engineering team to design and develop a prototype medical task trainer focused on improving accessibility and user interactivity for clinical skills training.
- Engineered an affordable, interactive IV insertion simulator by embedding force-sensitive pressure sensors within custom-molded silicone skin, enabling real-time detection of excessive insertion depth or force.
- Programmed embedded firmware on Arduino Uno to interface with analog pressure sensors, streaming live data via serial communication to a MATLAB-based GUI.
- Implemented real-time signal processing and data visualization in MATLAB, enabling dynamic feedback and quantitative performance metrics for nursing students during IV insertion training.
- Presented technical design and implementation details to project sponsors, achieving 3rd place & a $1,500 prize in a competitive innovation challenge.
- Arduino
- MATLAB
- Sensors
- Signal Processing
// 04 // skills
tech.stack
> 01_languages
Languages
- C
- C++
- Python
- Java
- VHDL
- Assembly
- Bash
> 02_devops
DevOps & Automation
- Git
- CI/CD
- Docker
- Ansible
- Pytest
> 03_protocols
Communication Protocols
- UART
- CAN
- I²C
- SPI
> 04_debug
Debugging & Testing
- JTAG
- GDB
- PCAN-USB
- Serial Debugging
> 05_embedded
Embedded Systems
- Arduino (ARM)
- Raspberry Pi (Linux)
- FPGA
// 05 // education
academic.history
Queen's University
B.Eng.Sc. — Computer Engineering · 2021 — 2026
GPA 3.97 · Dean's List 2021 — 2026
Kingston, ON, Canada
Notable courses: Digital Systems, Computer Architecture, Data Structures, Autonomous Robotics, Object Oriented Programming, Microprocessor Systems, Operating Systems, Algorithms, Safety Critical Software Engineering, Machine Learning, Computer Vision.
Nanyang Technological University
Semester Abroad · January — May 2024
Singapore
Notable courses: Software Development, Database Systems, Computer Networks.