Title : Founding Engineer
Location: San Francisco, CA
Hire type : FTE
The Role
You'll be a "GME" (General Manager of Engineering): architect, builder, and customer-facing problem solver all in one. No hand-holding. Full ownership.
Core technical domains:
- Entity resolution / MDP matching across messy supply chain data
- Product substitution via RAG
- Pricing discovery & automated procurement workflows
- Durable-execution agent platform (distributed systems at scale)
- Agentic search infrastructure
Comprehensive Person Spec
Must-Haves (Dealbreakers if missing)
Attribute : Detail
Technical excellence : Strong CS fundamentals, track record of shipping high-impact work
Systems experience : Distributed systems, durable execution, complex system design, or large-scale data manipulation
Language proficiency : Node.js, Python, or TypeScript (flexible, but these are preferred)
Customer-facing ability : Comfortable getting on the phone with buyers/suppliers; common-sense communicator
Commercial/product sense : Can translate messy real-world problems into shipped solutions
Autonomy & hunger : Shows up early, grinds without direction, ships relentlessly
Something remarkable : A standout achievement (school or work) that signals top-tier calibre
Other required traits
- Prior Founding Engineer, Founding AI Engineer, MTS, or Forward Deployed Engineer experience
- Background at top-tier engineering brands: OpenAI, Databricks, OpenEvidence, or similar
- AI/LLM infrastructure experience (RAG, agentic systems, entity matching)
Red Flags to Screen Out
- Multiple short stints (job-hopping pattern)
- Startup experience that is part-time or remote consulting (HM has flagged this as a weak negative signal looks good on paper but doesn't pass the bar)
- Narrow scope of work / no evidence of end-to-end ownership
- Needs heavy management or direction
- Unremarkable career arc with no standout achievement
