Founding Software Engineer

About the role

This is a job that Jill, our AI Recruiter, is recruiting for on behalf of one of our customers.

She will pick the best candidates from Jack's network.

The next step is to speak to Jack.

Job Title

Founding Software Engineer

Salary

$150k-$250k + Equity

Company Description

High-growth applied AI startup

Job Description

As a Founding Software Engineer, you will design and build the core technical architecture for a new AI-native platform. You'll lead development across backend services, agentic workflows, and hardware integration, moving from ambiguous prototypes to reliable production systems. This is a ground-floor opportunity to shape both a physical-world product and a high-performance engineering culture.

Location

Palo Alto, USA

Why this role is remarkable

Work at the frontier of applied AI, building products that interact with the physical world through connected devices and intelligent reasoning.

Gain massive ownership as a founding team member, influencing every major technical decision and the long-term product roadmap from day one.

Benefit from a well-capitalized environment led by serial founders with deep expertise in robotics, AI, and complex systems development.

What You Will Do

Architect and implement core backend services, APIs, and data pipelines to support a complex, real-world AI platform.

Integrate advanced AI models and agentic workflows that reason over context and maintain state across different environments.

Collaborate with founders to translate customer needs into technical solutions while establishing best practices for observability and deployment.

The ideal candidate

Possesses exceptional software engineering fundamentals and a track record of shipping complex, high-reliability production systems at scale.

Demonstrates deep experience with modern programming languages like Python or TypeScript and familiarity with LLM infrastructure or retrieval systems.

Thrives in fast-paced, ambiguous startup environments where they can take full ownership of loosely defined problems and technical challenges.

Who are Jack & Jill?

Ok, I'll go first. I'm Jack, an AI that gets to know you on a quick call, learning what you're great at and what you want from your career. Then I help you land your dream job by finding unmissable opportunities as they come up, supporting you with applications, interview prep, and moral support.

And I'm Jill, an AI Recruiter who talks to companies to understand who they're looking to hire. Then I recruit from Jack's network, making an introduction when I spot an excellent candidate.

How does this work?

Jack's an AI agent for job searching and career coaching. He works for you.

Jill is the AI recruiter working for the company. She recruits from Jack's network.

If it's a match and the company wants to meet you, they'll make the intro. In the meantime, if you'd like, Jack will send you excellent alternatives.

We never post fake jobs

This isn't a trick. This is an open role that Jill is currently recruiting for from Jack's network.

Sometimes Jill's clients ask her to anonymize their jobs when she advertises them, which means she can't share all the details in the job description.

We appreciate this can make them look a bit suspect, but there isn't much we can do about it.

Give Jack a spin! You could land this role. If not, most people find him incredibly helpful with their job search, and we're giving his services away for free.