Founding Research Engineer

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Role Details

Company: US-based applied AI startup

Location: San Francisco Bay Area, CA

Employment Type: Full-time

Work Arrangement: On-site

Experience: 1–6 years

Visa Sponsorship: Available

About the Company

An applied AI company developing autonomous agents that execute complex finance and operational workflows within enterprise systems. The company has raised $8M and works with Fortune 500 customers across consumer goods, distribution, technology, and energy. Its team includes professionals from leading AI research labs and technology companies.

About the Role

The company is seeking a Founding Research Engineer to develop and scale AI agents capable of executing complex enterprise workflows safely and reliably. The role combines machine learning, software engineering, and applied AI research, with ownership of critical systems from initial design through production deployment.

Responsibilities

• Build reliable AI agents with self-checking and verification capabilities.

• Develop agent workflows, RAG systems, and model evaluation tools.

• Build secure infrastructure and optimize AI inference for enterprise systems.

• Improve model performance and productionize AI pipelines.

• Collaborate with enterprise customers on technical projects.

• Contribute to product strategy and engineering standards.

Requirements

• 1–6 years of software or machine learning engineering experience.

• Proven ability to write production code and ship software within a team codebase.

• Machine learning experience through research, internships, or professional work.

• Hands-on experience with LLMs, AI platforms, agent workflows, or model evaluation.

• Strong engineering skills in building, deploying, and maintaining production systems.

Benefits

• Competitive compensation and potential equity.

• Opportunity to work on challenging enterprise AI problems.

• Direct impact on product development and technical strategy.

• High ownership, minimal bureaucracy, and a fast-moving engineering environment.

• Visa sponsorship available.

Interview Process

• Initial screening.

• Technical deep dive and problem-solving.

• On-site interview with the founders.

• Offer and hiring.