Staff Product Engineer

Hyperexponential; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 75,000 - 110,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Training budget (£5,000) reduced by 2?

Holiday: 33 days (25 + 8)

Wellbeing allowance

Private healthcare

Income protection

Life Insurance

Cycle to Work

Hackathons

Office in London

Job summary

Hyperexponential is building an AI-powered platform for pricing and underwriting in insurance, enabling faster decisions and scaling globally. Engineers work in small pods, owning problems end-to-end from discovery to production, with a career mentor guiding development and progression.

The role is AI-native, with a focus on building robust systems and tooling that scale across streams and domains. You’ll ship end-to-end production systems, collaborate across polyglot tech stacks, and leverage

Qualifications

• Experience building production-grade software.
• Comfort with polyglot environments and cross-functional collaboration.
• Ability to work in autonomous, pod-based teams.

Responsibilities

• Take a customer problem from discovery to production within a pod.
• Direct AI agents to draft implementation, tests and migrations, then review and harden output.
• Design and deliver robust production systems with strong observability and performance.
• Work across the codebase and move between domains as priorities change.
• Rely on AI tools judiciously to inform engineering decisions and outcomes.

Skills

Rust

Python

C/C++

AI/ML

Software engineering

Tools

Git

CI/CD

Job description

At hyperexponential, we're building the AI-powered platform that enables the world's most critical decisions in a $7 trillion industry - which risks to take, and how to price them. These are the decisions that shape real-world outcomes: whether rockets successfully launch into space, autonomous vehicles make it to market, or communities recover after major storms.

Until now, insurance has been making billion-dollar decisions using outdated tools. We're changing that. Our platform brings together data, AI, and human expertise to give insurers the fastest path from submission to decision - helping them move faster, act smarter, and take on more risk with confidence.

Backed by a16z, Highland Europe, and Battery Ventures, we're scaling globally - already trusted by nearly 50 of the world's largest insurers, with zero churn and billions in premiums flowing through hx.

What began as a single product in one market has rapidly evolved into a multi-product, multi-territory platform powering every stage of pricing and underwriting. AI is at the core of what we do - from building the world's first domain-specific AI peer programmer for insurance (think GitHub Copilot with a PhD in actuarial science) to shaping agentic workflows that reinvent how this industry operates.

What makes hx different is the people who build it. Here, impact isn't tied to title or tenure; it's defined by the challenges you take on and the discipline you bring. Surrounded by peers who stretch you, you'll do the best, hardest work of your life in a company engineered to endure.

If that sounds like you, join us in building what comes next.

How we work

We're in the middle of a deliberate shift in how hx builds. Everyone in product development is a Builder, and the Product Engineer is the default unit of how we work.

We organise around problems, not permanent teams. Small pods, usually of two to four Product Engineers, form around the highest-value problem, own it end-to-end from discovery through to running it in production, and re-form as priorities change. Pods sit inside value streams, each owning a customer outcome and led by a Stream Lead who decides which problems the stream takes on and holds the bar for what ships. Your growth sits elsewhere: a Career Mentor owns your development and progression, so you can move to where the most important problem is without your career following the org chart.

We hire Product Engineers into hx, not into a fixed team, domain, or layer of the stack. You'll start in the stream where your strengths and our highest-value problems meet, and move as the problems move.

Product Engineers are T-shaped: deep expertise in software engineering, plus enough product and design judgement to make routine calls yourself. An embedded PM or designer raises a pod's ceiling on the hardest problems, but is never a gate between you and the customer. This is also a deliberately AI-native role, and one of the areas where we're moving fastest.

A pod of three owns its problem whole, which means going wherever it leads: front end, back end, data, or infrastructure. You don't need to be full-stack by trade, but you do need to be comfortable working outside your strongest layer.

The Product Engineer role is the same at every level. What scales is the size of the problem you own, how expensive your decisions are to reverse, and how far your judgement travels beyond your pod. At Level 4, that looks like this:

What you'll be doing

Taking a customer problem from discovery to production inside a pod, getting close to customers yourself, framing the problem, and shipping in small increments guided by real customer signal rather than internal opinion.

Directing AI agents to draft implementation, tests, and migrations, then reviewing, integrating, and hardening that work. You'll write intent precisely enough to brief both a teammate and an agent, and own correctness and maintainability regardless of how the first draft was produced.

Designing and delivering robust production systems where correctness, performance, and resource efficiency matter, with the tests and observability that make complex behaviour safe to evolve.

Working across the codebase wherever the problem leads, including areas your pod doesn't steward, with stewards looped in proportionate to the risk rather than handing work off and waiting.

Moving between pods, problems, and streams as priorities change, ramping fast on unfamiliar domains and leaving what you built running well behind you.

Taking full accountability for outcomes rather than just your code changes: raising risks early, and deciding rather than escalating.

What you’ll have done

Built and shipped production systems end-to-end, from design through rollout, monitoring, and iteration, in settings where correctness, performance, and resource efficiency mattered.

Designed testing and observability that made complex behaviour understandable, debuggable, and safe to evolve.

Worked effectively in a polyglot environment, choosing the right tool for the problem and picking up unfamiliar languages, domains, and codebases fast. Strong systems experience, for example in Rust, C/C++, or Python, is valued, and we'll upskill you where there are gaps.

Shipped work outside your strongest layer of the stack when the problem needed it, picking up the front end, the data layer, or the infrastructure rather than waiting for someone else.

Used AI tools as a serious part of how you build, with the judgement to direct, review, and stand behind what they produce.

Carried product and design judgement into your engineering work, shaping the solution rather than only implementing a spec and making sensible calls under ambiguity.

Owned outcomes beyond your immediate task, taking decisions rather than escalating them.

At Level 4 we'll also look for

Set technical direction on a hard problem other engineers built on, and been judged on whether you made them faster and safer rather than on the size of your team.

Held a quality bar across other people's work without becoming the gate they wait on.

Led cross-cutting or decoupling work that teams adopted because it was the best path, not because it was mandated.

You’re unlikely to thrive here if

You prefer following detailed instructions rather than experimenting and finding your own approach.

You are uncomfortable working directly with non-technical stakeholders to understand their challenges.

You avoid tackling ambiguous or open-ended problems where the solution isn’t obvious.

If reading our Culture Document leaves you feeling neutral rather than energised, hx may not be the place where you’ll do your best work. We’re building something that asks for commitment and conviction, and we want you to feel excited by the opportunity to grow with us.

Compensation

At hx, we’re committed to salary transparency. You’ll always have clarity on pay early in the process - our Talent Partner will share details with you during initial conversations - and we’re working toward publishing salary information for all roles globally.

Because we’re building at the intersection of technology/SaaS and insurance, our roles don’t always map neatly onto traditional benchmarks. Our approach is to design compensation that’s competitive in the market, fair across teams, and aligned with the impact our people make.

£5,000 training and conference budget for individual and group development.

25 days of holiday plus 8 bank holidays (33 days total).

Individual wellbeing allowance via Juno.

Private healthcare insurance through AXA.

Income protection and Life Insurance.

Cycle to Work Scheme.

Regular remote and in-person hackathons, lunch and learns, socials, and game nights.

Team breakfasts and lunches, snacks, drinks fridge, and a fun office at The Ministry.

Exceptional opportunities for personal development and growth as we build something remarkable together.

Initial chat with our Talent team

Live AI Skills Assessment

Values Interview with the CPTO

Meet the CEO

Our commitment to Diversity

hxers are at the centre of everything we build. We know that progress depends on diverse perspectives, and we are committed to creating an environment where everyone can thrive, grow, and make an impact. We recognise there is always more to do, and we take responsibility for shaping a workplace that is not only diverse but genuinely inclusive.

Diversity is not just the right thing to do, it is key to solving the complex challenges we choose to take on. By welcoming people from all backgrounds and experiences, we strengthen our ability to question assumptions, push boundaries, and design solutions that endure.

If you're energised by complexity and motivated to grow, we encourage you to apply and join our global team.

Please note that background checks will be conducted as part of the hiring process to ensure compliance with our governance policies. We handle all background checks sensitively and in full compliance with relevant regulations. All applicant data will be processed in accordance with data protection regulations and our privacy policy.

Please note that background checks will be conducted as part of the hiring process to ensure compliance with our governance policies. We handle all background checks sensitively and in full compliance with relevant regulations. All applicant data will be processed in accordance with data protection regulations and our privacy policy.

Our work environment is vital for the work we do.

500 7th Avenue,8th Floor, New York,NY10018