Founding Engineer

Ai Futures; Berlin; On-site; EUR 110,000 - 170,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Job summary

Ai Futures is seeking a Founding AI Engineer in Berlin to build the core AI-native product from scratch. You will work directly with enterprise customers, turn their requirements into features, and make pivotal architectural decisions, while shaping the engineering culture alongside the founders.

You will own end‑to‑end delivery, prototype aggressively, and deliver scalable solutions in a fast-paced, on-site startup environment in Berlin. Equity is offered alongside a strong salary package.

Qualifications

• Strong software / AI engineering background.
• Experience shipping production software.
• Hands-on with LLMs, Gen AI or Agentic AI.
• Comfortable APIs, databases, cloud environments.

Responsibilities

• Build core parts of AI-native product from 0→1.
• Develop production LLM, GenAI and Agentic AI applications.
• Work with enterprise customers to understand problems and workflows.
• Turn customer requirements into features and technical solutions.
• Build APIs, integrations and workflows across customer systems.
• Make architectural and product decisions.
• Prototype ideas and turn experiments into features.
• Troubleshoot in real customer environments.
• Feed customer insights into the product roadmap.
• Collaborate with founders on strategy.

Skills

LLMs

Generative AI

Backend Dev

APIs & Integrations

Cloud Environments

Enterprise Customers

0→1 Builder

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

Git

CI/CD

Job description

Founding AI Engineer | AI-Native Startup | Berlin

Location: Berlin (On-site)

Employment: Full-time

Package: Competitive salary + Equity

AI Futures has been exclusively retained to identify a Founding AI Engineer for a well-funded, early-stage AI startup in Berlin.

We're looking for a strong 0→1 engineer who wants genuine founding-team responsibility – building the core product, working directly with customers and helping determine what gets built next.

This isn't a role where Product hands you a finished specification. You'll speak directly with users, understand their problems and then design, build and deploy the solution yourself.

The Role

• Build core parts of an AI-native product from 0→1.
• Develop production LLM, GenAI and Agentic AI applications.
• Work directly with enterprise customers to understand complex problems and workflows.
• Turn customer requirements into product features and technical solutions.
• Build APIs, integrations and workflows across customer systems and data.
• Make important architectural and product decisions.
• Rapidly prototype ideas and turn successful experiments into scalable features.
• Troubleshoot problems in real customer environments.
• Feed customer insights directly into the product roadmap.
• Work closely with the founders on product and technical strategy.
• Help shape the engineering culture and future technical team.

What We’re Looking For

• Strong Software / AI Engineering background.
• Experience building and shipping production software.
• Hands‑on experience with LLMs, Generative AI or Agentic AI.
• Strong backend or full‑stack engineering fundamentals.
• Comfortable with APIs, databases, integrations and cloud environments.
• Genuine 0→1 builder mindset.
• Able to take an ambiguous problem and independently work out what should be built.
• Strong enough technically to build it, but commercial enough to understand why it matters to the customer.
• Comfortable working directly with enterprise users and senior stakeholders.
• High ownership, entrepreneurial and comfortable without an established playbook.
• Founding Engineer, early employee or startup experience is highly desirable.
• Previous pre‑seed, seed or Series A experience is particularly attractive.
• Based in Berlin or willing to relocate and work predominantly on‑site.

Why Join?

• Join as a Founding AI Engineer, not another engineer within an established team.
• Build the product 0→1 alongside the founders.
• Work directly with the customers actually using what you build.
• Significant influence over product, architecture and technical direction.
• Own problems end‑to‑end rather than working through tickets.
• Help define the engineering culture and future team.
• Remain deeply hands‑on while gaining broader product and commercial ownership.
• Meaningful equity participation and long‑term upside.

We're particularly interested in engineers who don't want to choose between building the core product and being close to the customer.