Founding Backend Software Engineer

ABOUT THE ROLE

Join an early-stage AI video team as its founding backend engineer. You will lead the design of the backend and agentic infrastructure that powers AI-driven video creation, while helping establish engineering standards for a small, high-caliber team.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

• Design and build scalable backend systems for AI video products.
• Develop infrastructure for agentic workflows, video generation pipelines, reinforcement learning loops, and real-time data processing.
• Own distributed systems architecture and improve reliability through automated testing, performance benchmarking, and end-to-end observability.
• Partner with researchers, engineers, and designers to build product features and APIs.
• Set technical direction and engineering standards through strong implementation, clear documentation, and effective communication.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

• Five to ten years of backend software engineering experience, including work at early-stage or high-growth startups.
• Industry experience building scalable backend and distributed systems, large-scale data processing, information retrieval, and asynchronous workflows.
• At least 12 months of industry experience designing and building agentic systems, LLMs, or generative AI products.
• Professional experience with TypeScript and AWS, including relevant services such as S3, Lambda, RDS, SQS, or ECS.
• Experience as a technical lead, setting technical direction and code standards for a team.
• A formal degree, strong computer science fundamentals, and fluent English communication skills.

COMPENSATION & BENEFITS

Base salary: $225,000 to $275,000 annually. Visa sponsorship is not available.

LOCATION

On-site, five days per week in San Francisco, California.