Founding Full-Stack Engineer

Location

New York, NY

Fully onsite, 5 days per week.

Company Stage of Funding

Early-Stage / Seed-Stage AI SaaS Company

Office Type

On-site — 5 days per week

Salary

$160,000 – $250,000 Base

Equity

Meaningful Early-Stage Equity

Visa

Open to visa transfers, including OPT and H1B transfers.

Experience

2–6 years of experience as a full-stack software engineer building products for end users, ideally in an early-stage startup environment.

Employment Type

Full-time

Hiring Count

Early / Growth Hiring — 1–2 hires

Company Description

This is an early-stage AI company building an AI-native operating system for the wholesale industry. The company is modernizing a large, underserved market that still relies heavily on spreadsheets, email chains, and disconnected operational systems.

The platform uses AI-powered agents alongside software infrastructure to help businesses manage complex wholesale operations. The core technology includes data pipelines, integrations, APIs, workflow systems, and operator-facing tools that connect AI capabilities to real-world business processes.

The engineering team is extremely small, giving early engineers significant influence over the product, architecture, engineering culture, and technical foundation. You will work across the entire stack, from backend services and data pipelines to frontend applications and customer-facing workflows.

As a Founding Full-Stack Engineer, you will take customer-facing features from concept through production. You will speak directly with users, understand their problems, design solutions, build them, and observe how customers use the product.

This is a highly hands-on founding-level role for someone who enjoys building from scratch, working across the stack, and taking ownership without waiting for detailed specifications. The strongest candidates will combine strong technical execution with excellent product intuition and a high bar for user experience.

What You Will Do

1. Build & Iterate on Customer-Facing Products

• Take customer-facing features from concept through production.
• Talk directly with users to understand their workflows and pain points.
• Translate customer feedback into product improvements.
• Build polished product experiences with a high bar for UI/UX.
• Work across React, TypeScript, Next.js, and Tailwind on the frontend.
• Iterate rapidly based on real-world customer feedback.
• Own features from initial problem definition through launch and continued improvement.

2. Build Data Pipelines, APIs & Core Infrastructure

• Design secure, auditable data models that support critical business workflows.
• Build event-driven data pipelines that power AI agent workflows.
• Develop internal and external APIs.
• Build reliable backend services using TypeScript and Node.js.
• Work with PostgreSQL and cloud infrastructure across AWS and GCP.
• Design systems that maintain data consistency across multiple external platforms.
• Build reliable infrastructure for high-volume operational workflows.

3. Build Integrations & Real-Time Operator Systems

• Build first-party integrations with ERPs, logistics providers, retailers, freight partners, and other third-party systems.
• Develop resilient synchronization systems that keep data across platforms in lockstep.
• Build real-time operator consoles that provide customers with visibility into their operations.
• Design systems for monitoring, observability, and operational reliability.
• Establish SLOs and engineering practices for mission-critical workflows.
• Work across backend, data engineering, and frontend wherever the highest-leverage problem exists.

4. Work Directly With Customers & Own Problems End-to-End

• Work directly with customers to identify and solve high-impact problems.
• Own technical and product decisions with minimal oversight.
• Collaborate closely with the founding team on product strategy and engineering priorities.
• Take ambiguous problems and turn them into working software.
• Balance speed, reliability, usability, and long-term maintainability.
• Establish engineering standards and technical practices as an early member of the team.
• Help shape the product, culture, and technical foundation of the company.

Ideal Candidate Background

Experience Requirements

• 2–6 years of professional full-stack software engineering experience.
• Strong experience building products for end users.
• Experience working at a B2B or B2C SaaS startup with a high bar for product quality.
• Experience working in a startup with fewer than 25 employees is strongly preferred.
• Experience owning features end-to-end with high agency and minimal oversight.
• Experience taking products or features from concept through production.
• Strong product intuition and customer orientation.
• Comfortable working in an early-stage environment where responsibilities are broad.
• Candidates with 1–2 years of experience should demonstrate exceptional product ability through top-tier technical experience, strong product-focused projects, or a strong technical academic background.

Technical Requirements

• Strong TypeScript experience.
• Strong Node.js backend development experience.
• Strong React experience.
• Experience with Next.js.
• Experience with Tailwind CSS.
• Strong PostgreSQL and relational database fundamentals.
• Experience building APIs and backend services.
• Experience with cloud infrastructure, ideally AWS or GCP.
• Experience designing data models and data pipelines.
• Experience building integrations with third-party systems.
• Familiarity with event-driven architecture and asynchronous workflows.
• Strong debugging and troubleshooting skills.
• Ability to make pragmatic architecture and technical tradeoff decisions.

AI, Data & Infrastructure Requirements

• Experience building software infrastructure around AI-powered products is strongly preferred.
• Understanding of how APIs, data pipelines, integrations, and application infrastructure support AI workflows.
• Experience building reliable data pipelines and synchronization systems.
• Experience with event-driven systems or workflow orchestration is valuable.
• Ability to design systems that are observable, reliable, and auditable.
• Understanding of production reliability, monitoring, SLOs, and operational practices.
• Comfortable working with complex data flows across multiple external systems.
• Strong interest in AI-native products and AI-powered workflows.

Product & Full-Stack Engineering Requirements

• Strong ability to move between frontend, backend, database, and infrastructure work.
• Experience building polished, customer-facing applications.
• Strong product intuition and ability to translate customer feedback into product improvements.
• Experience designing APIs and third-party integrations.
• Experience working with data-heavy and operationally complex applications.
• Ability to maintain a high bar for UI/UX.
• Comfortable owning both technical implementation and product decisions.
• Experience working directly with customers or product users is strongly preferred.
• Ability to balance speed of execution with reliability and maintainability.

Soft Skills

• Exceptional ownership and accountability.
• Highly proactive and self-directed.
• Comfortable operating without detailed specifications.
• Strong product instincts.
• Customer-oriented mindset.
• Clear and direct communicator.
• Strong problem-solving skills.
• Comfortable receiving feedback and iterating quickly.
• Able to work closely with founders and early employees.
• Comfortable shifting priorities as the company evolves.
• Strong attention to detail.
• High technical curiosity.
• Strong startup mentality.
• Willingness to build from scratch and take on whatever problem has the highest leverage.

Compensation & Benefits

• $160,000 – $250,000 base salary.
• Meaningful early-stage equity.
• Opportunity to join as a founding-level engineer.
• Opportunity to shape the product and technical foundation from an early stage.
• Visa transfers supported, including OPT and H1B transfers.
• Opportunity to work directly with founders and customers.
• Small, highly collaborative engineering team.
• Fully onsite in New York City.

Why Join

• Join at a genuinely early stage where your technical decisions can materially shape the company.
• Build AI-native software solving complex real-world operational problems.
• Work across the entire stack rather than owning a narrow technical surface.
• Build the infrastructure around AI agents, including APIs, data pipelines, integrations, and operator tools.
• Work directly with customers and see the impact of what you build.
• Have significant ownership over architecture, product, and engineering standards.
• Join a very small team with substantial individual impact.
• Work on a large, underserved market with significant room for technology-driven transformation.
• Build products from scratch rather than maintaining legacy systems.
• Help establish the technical foundation and engineering culture of an early-stage company.