Founding Engineer

Location

New York City, NY

On-site in Chelsea, NYC, with a strong preference for 4–5 days per week in the office. Flexible working hours.

Company Stage of Funding

Early-stage, venture-backed startup

• Funding: Seed round led by Dragonfly and Multicoin.

• Hiring goal: 1 Founding Engineer.

• Team: Small founding team with experience across consumer technology, blockchain, and trading platforms.

Office Type

On-site in Chelsea, New York City, with a strong preference for 4–5 days per week in the office. The team values in-person collaboration but offers flexible working hours. Candidates who prefer starting later and working later can be accommodated, provided they maintain strong productivity and collaborate effectively with the team.

Candidates already based in New York City or the surrounding area are preferred. Relocation support may be considered on a case-by-case basis for candidates specifically targeting a move to NYC.

Salary

$175,000–$275,000 base salary, depending on experience.

Equity

1–2% founding equity.

This is a meaningful ownership opportunity for an early engineering hire who will help shape the product, frontend architecture, and technical direction.

Visa

Visa transfers may be considered, including OPT and H-1B transfers. Sponsorship and transfer arrangements should be confirmed with the company on a case-by-case basis.

Employment Type

Full-time

Company Description

This company is building a consumer trading platform that allows sports fans to invest in the performance of professional athletes. The product is designed to create a stock-market-like experience for athletes, combining real-time trading, portfolio management, and blockchain-based settlement in an intuitive consumer application.

The platform aims to make the underlying blockchain infrastructure largely invisible to users, delivering a seamless experience through fast, polished interfaces and straightforward trading workflows. The product presents an opportunity to build a new category of consumer financial technology at the intersection of sports, trading, and crypto.

The company is backed by Dragonfly and Multicoin, investors known for backing companies in the crypto and digital asset ecosystem. The founding team brings experience from leading technology and blockchain organizations, including Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and Dapper Labs.

The engineering team is small and highly technical. The CTO brings approximately five years of experience at Apple and five years at Google. The founding backend engineer has experience building a leading trading web application and has previously worked at Microsoft and Amazon. The founding blockchain engineer has experience shipping NBA Top Shot at Dapper Labs.

The company is initially targeting international markets while navigating uncertainty around the US legal and regulatory environment for prediction-market-adjacent products.

The Founding Engineer will be responsible for leading development of the consumer-facing web application. Although the role was initially frontend-focused, the company is now open to frontend-leaning full-stack engineers. Candidates must have strong frontend engineering skills, particularly React, along with the ability to reason about performance, complex application state, real-time data, and the overall user experience.

This is a green-field engineering opportunity rather than a role maintaining a mature application. The engineer will make meaningful decisions about frontend architecture, product functionality, and the technical roadmap while working directly with the cofounders.

The company values product judgment as much as implementation ability. Strong candidates understand not only how an interface looks, but also how it behaves, feels, and performs in the hands of users. Engineers are expected to move quickly, take ownership, and contribute to product decisions.

What You Will Do

1. Own the Consumer Web Trading Platform

• Lead development of the consumer-facing web application for a trading platform centered on professional athletes.

• Build polished, intuitive interfaces that help sports fans explore markets, trade, and manage their portfolios.

• Translate product requirements into responsive, reliable, and high-performance frontend experiences.

• Take ownership of major product surfaces from initial design and implementation through launch and iteration.

• Work directly with the founders to prioritize features and shape the user experience.

• Establish frontend development patterns and standards as the product evolves.

• Make meaningful technical decisions in a green-field environment.

2. Build High-Performance Frontend Systems

• Develop robust web applications using React, TypeScript, and JavaScript.

• Design and implement reusable components and maintainable frontend architecture.

• Optimize application performance, responsiveness, and reliability.

• Manage complex application state across trading flows, portfolio views, and real-time updates.

• Build interfaces that remain intuitive as underlying workflows become more technically complex.

• Identify and resolve performance bottlenecks, rendering issues, and frontend reliability problems.

• Ensure that the application feels fast and responsive during critical user interactions.

3. Build Real-Time Trading and Portfolio Experiences

• Develop trading interfaces that display dynamic market information and real-time data.

• Build portfolio views and interactive components that help users understand their positions and activity.

• Design clear feedback and interaction patterns for transactions and changing market conditions.

• Handle complex frontend state associated with trading workflows and asynchronous operations.

• Ensure that users can understand the status of their actions without needing to understand the underlying infrastructure.

• Work through edge cases involving delayed responses, changing data, and transaction states.

• Build a reliable and intuitive experience for users interacting with a new type of financial product.

4. Make Blockchain Complexity Invisible to Users

• Build frontend workflows that connect consumer interactions with underlying blockchain infrastructure.

• Collaborate with backend and blockchain engineers on APIs, transaction flows, and system integration.

• Help design user experiences that make onchain settlement feel straightforward and accessible.

• Translate technical constraints into clear product behavior and understandable interface states.

• Handle loading, confirmation, failure, and other transaction-related states thoughtfully.

• Work across service boundaries to ensure a consistent experience from the user's initial action through completion.

• Contribute to decisions that balance technical correctness with usability.

5. Drive Frontend Architecture and Technical Decisions

• Own important frontend architecture decisions as the platform is built from the ground up.

• Develop scalable patterns for components, state management, data fetching, and application organization.

• Evaluate technical trade-offs involving performance, reliability, maintainability, and development velocity.

• Help establish how the frontend interacts with backend services and external infrastructure.

• Identify opportunities to simplify the application without compromising its functionality.

• Build reusable abstractions that support future product features.

• Contribute to the broader technical roadmap alongside the cofounders and engineering team.

6. Apply Strong Product Judgment

• Participate in product discussions and help determine how features should work, not just how they should look.

• Understand the needs and expectations of consumer users interacting with a trading product.

• Identify friction in key user journeys and propose practical improvements.

• Make thoughtful decisions about interaction patterns, information hierarchy, and application behavior.

• Balance visual polish with functionality, performance, and usability.

• Challenge unclear product requirements and suggest better solutions when appropriate.

• Iterate based on user feedback, product priorities, and observed behavior.

• Take ownership of the complete user experience rather than treating implementation as a handoff from design.

7. Collaborate Across the Full Stack

• Work closely with backend and blockchain engineers to deliver integrated product features.

• Help design APIs and data flows that support frontend functionality.

• Contribute to service-based architecture decisions where frontend and backend concerns intersect.

• Investigate issues that span the frontend, APIs, data flows, and transaction infrastructure.

• Take on full-stack work when useful, while maintaining strong frontend ownership.

• Communicate technical constraints and implementation trade-offs clearly.

• Help the team deliver complete product experiences rather than isolated technical components.

8. Operate as a Founding-Level Engineer

• Work directly with the cofounders to shape the product and engineering roadmap.

• Take broad ownership of technical problems without waiting for extensive specifications.

• Make independent decisions and move quickly in a small, high-ownership team.

• Help establish engineering practices as the organization grows.

• Identify opportunities to improve product quality, development velocity, and technical architecture.

• Contribute to the company's direction beyond the immediate scope of assigned tickets.

• Take responsibility for the outcomes of features and systems you build.

• Help create a strong technical foundation for future engineering hires.

Ideal Candidate Background

Experience Requirements

• Approximately 2–8 years of frontend engineering experience.

• Strong professional experience building consumer-facing web applications.

• Demonstrated expertise in React.

• Strong JavaScript and/or TypeScript proficiency.

• Experience shipping polished, production-ready web products.

• Strong understanding of frontend performance, application state, and reliability.

• Ability to own features and technical projects from implementation through release.

• Product judgment that extends beyond visual design to how a feature works and feels for users.

• Comfortable working in a small, fast-moving, early-stage team.

• Willingness to work on-site in Chelsea, New York City, 4–5 days per week.

Education Requirements

• No specific degree or university requirement has been provided.

• Bootcamp graduates and self-taught engineers are welcome.

• Prioritize demonstrated professional engineering ability, production experience, product judgment, and ownership over educational credentials alone.

• Candidates from nontraditional educational backgrounds should have a credible track record of building and shipping production software.

Frontend Engineering

• Strong React expertise is essential.

• Proficiency in TypeScript and JavaScript.

• Experience building and maintaining production consumer web applications.

• Ability to design reusable components and maintainable frontend systems.

• Understanding of rendering performance, browser behavior, and frontend reliability.

• Experience working with APIs, asynchronous operations, and dynamic application data.

• Ability to manage complex application state.

• Experience debugging and improving performance in real-world applications.

• Strong engineering fundamentals beyond visual implementation.

• Ability to make thoughtful frontend architecture decisions.

Product Engineering & User Experience

• Experience building polished, consumer-facing products.

• Strong product judgment and attention to interaction quality.

• Ability to reason about how a feature behaves and feels in practice.

• Experience improving user journeys and reducing unnecessary friction.

• Ability to balance design quality with technical feasibility and performance.

• Willingness to challenge requirements and suggest better product solutions.

• Experience working closely with founders, product managers, or designers is valuable.

• Demonstrated ownership of user-facing features from concept through launch.

Real-Time Applications & Complex State

• Experience building interfaces with frequently changing data.

• Familiarity with complex state management and asynchronous workflows.

• Ability to build responsive interfaces for data-heavy applications.

• Experience developing interactive charts, dashboards, portfolio views, or similar interfaces is beneficial.

• Understanding of loading, error, success, and transaction states.

• Ability to handle edge cases without compromising the user experience.

• Experience with performance-sensitive consumer applications.

Full-Stack & Service Integration

• Frontend expertise remains the primary requirement.

• Experience integrating frontend applications with backend APIs.

• Familiarity with service-based architectures and distributed application components.

• Ability to reason about API design and data flows.

• Willingness to contribute to backend-facing implementation when needed.

• Experience with transaction flows, financial systems, or blockchain integrations is valuable.

• Ability to collaborate effectively with backend and infrastructure engineers.

Trading, Fintech & Crypto Experience

• Experience building trading products, fintech platforms, crypto applications, or other data-intensive consumer products is a plus.

• Familiarity with trading interfaces, market data, portfolio management, or financial workflows is beneficial.

• Experience integrating blockchain functionality into consumer-facing products is valuable.

• Understanding of how to make technically complex financial workflows understandable to users is an advantage.

• Direct trading or crypto experience is not mandatory if the candidate has strong frontend skills and relevant consumer product experience.

Ownership & Problem-Solving

• High agency and a strong bias toward action.

• Ability to make technical progress with limited supervision.

• Experience building new product capabilities rather than exclusively maintaining existing applications.

• Strong judgment when evaluating technical trade-offs.

• Willingness to take responsibility for both implementation and user outcomes.

• Ability to work through ambiguous requirements.

• Comfort contributing to architecture and product decisions.

• Strong communication and collaboration skills.

• Motivation to make a meaningful impact as an early engineering hire.

Startup & Culture Fit

• Comfortable working in a small, early-stage team.

• Enjoys building products from zero to one.

• Motivated by ownership, speed, and meaningful equity.

• Comfortable working directly with founders.

• Able to balance fast execution with high engineering standards.

• Interested in helping shape both the product and the engineering organization.

• Comfortable with flexible working hours and an on-site working model.

• Interested in the opportunity to grow into broader technical leadership over time.

Nice-to-Have Qualifications

• Experience at a recognized, well-funded product company, such as Coinbase, Robinhood, or DraftKings.

• Experience building trading, fintech, crypto, or other financial consumer products.

• Experience working with real-time data feeds and interactive charts.

• Experience with complex portfolio or dashboard interfaces.

• Familiarity with blockchain integrations and onchain transaction workflows.

• Experience working in a service-based architecture.

• Experience contributing to backend APIs or full-stack features.

• Experience at an early-stage startup or as one of the first engineers on a product.

• Experience working closely with founders on product and architecture decisions.

• A credible professional engineering track record following a bootcamp or self-directed learning path.

Compensation & Benefits

• Base salary of $175,000–$275,000, depending on experience.

• 1–2% founding equity.

• Full-time role with direct access to the cofounders.

• Significant ownership of the consumer-facing trading platform.

• Opportunity to shape frontend architecture and the technical roadmap.

• Work alongside a founding team with experience across leading technology, trading, and blockchain companies.

• Green-field development with meaningful architectural decisions still to be made.

• Flexible working hours within an on-site, high-ownership team environment.

• Potential relocation support for candidates specifically targeting a move to New York City, subject to discussion.

• Potential consideration of visa transfers, including OPT and H-1B, subject to confirmation.

Why Join

• Build a new consumer trading experience: Help create a stock-market-like platform for professional athletes and sports fans.

• Receive meaningful founding equity: Participate in a 1–2% equity opportunity at a foundational stage of the business.

• Own the frontend from zero to one: Lead development of the core consumer application rather than maintaining a mature codebase.

• Solve challenging frontend problems: Work on real-time trading interfaces, complex application state, portfolio views, and dynamic data.

• Influence product direction: Work directly with the cofounders and help decide how the product should work and feel.

• Collaborate with an experienced team: Learn from engineers with backgrounds at Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and Dapper Labs.

• Work at the intersection of sports, finance, and crypto: Help make blockchain-enabled trading accessible through a polished consumer experience.

• Take genuine technical ownership: Shape architecture, establish engineering practices, and influence the technical roadmap.

• Join a well-backed early-stage company: Work with a team backed by Dragonfly and Multicoin.

• Grow with the company: Build a career path toward broader technical leadership as the organization scales.