Entrepreneur in Residence

Subcritical Systems Inc; Austin (TX); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 260,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Equity stake

Leadership access

Job summary

Subcritical Systems Inc. in Austin, TX is seeking an Entrepreneur in Residence who will shape software, AI, and deep-tech hardware for our Energy Amplifier program.

You will identify high-leverage AI problems, build AI-driven workflows, and drive a path toward a spin-out company from the project. You will lead AI-enabled CAD and regulatory tooling, with the aim of accelerating design cycles, improving documentation, and surfacing new business opportunities within a rapidly evolving clean energy

Qualifications

• Built something real: a company, product, or platform used by domain experts at scale.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals: Python/TypeScript, clean architecture, version control, testing, production-grade code.
• Demonstrated experience building with LLMs: prompt engineering, RAG architectures, agent frameworks, and API integration.
• Comfort with geometry, spatial data, or engineering file formats (CAD, STEP, mesh).
• High agency: identifies problems, proposes solutions, and executes with minimal guidance.

Responsibilities

• Design and deploy AI-assisted CAD review pipelines across geometry and interfaces.
• Build LLM-powered tooling integrated with CAD environments (Fusion 360, SolidWorks, NX).
• Develop automated workflows to generate CAD models and drawings from specs and vendor data.
• Own reliability and performance of design automation pipelines affecting construction schedule.
• Extend internal AI agent pipelines across engineering, operations, and deployment workstreams.
• Create workflows for procurement analysis, RFP parsing, and vendor compliance checks.

Skills

Startup experience

Software fundamentals

LLMs & prompts

Geometry/engineering data

High agency

Communication

Tools

LangChain

LlamaIndex

Job description

Subcritical Systems, Inc. is a venture-backed startup in Austin, Texas building accelerator-driven systems and the only U.S. commercial manufacturer of accelerator cavities. What SpaceX did for rockets, we plan to do for particle accelerators: manufacture at scale, move fast, and commercialize across power production, medical isotopes, semiconductors, and waste transmutation.

We are building the Energy Amplifier a novel nuclear fission system in which a particle accelerator drives a subcritical core, making melt physically impossible for clean power production. Due to its inherent safety, our system has a more streamlined licensing process. Our founding team includes successful entrepreneurs with a track record of building several multibillion-dollar companies in deep-tech, and scientists who led U.S. national labs with deep experience in accelerator & nuclear technologies.

We are actively hiring to expand our team as we work toward licensing, regulatory submissions, and construction of our first Energy Amplifier, with a target of commercial power production by 2028. More information is available at subcritical.com.

ROLE SUMMARY

This is not a conventional engineering hire. We are looking for an Entrepreneur in Residence who thinks like a founder, builds like an engineer, and has the range to operate across software, AI, and deep-tech hardware on one of the most consequential energy projects of the decade. Your mandate is to identify the highest-leverage software and AI problems across SSI’s programme collapsing our design-to-construction pipeline, building AI-driven workflows, and extending our internal agent architecture with a direct path to spinning out a standalone company from the work if the opportunity warrants it. Success in 12 months looks like: measurably faster CAD review cycles, a deployed AI agent pipeline contributing to engineering output, and at least one clearly defined spin‑out thesis in active development.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

CAD & Design Workflow Automation

• Design and deploy AI-assisted CAD review pipelines that parse geometry and models, flag interface conflicts, and surface design violations across systems, sub-systems, and components.
• Build LLM-powered tooling that integrates with CAD environments (Fusion 360, SolidWorks, NX) to accelerate documentation, BOM generation, and design change management.
• Develop automated workflows to generate CAD models and associated drawings from engineering specifications and vendor data inputs.
• Own the reliability and performance of design automation pipelines that directly gate our construction schedule.
• Contribute to and extend SETH SSI’s internal Systems Engineering Thinker AI agent pipeline across engineering, operations, and deployment workstreams that automate design documentation.
• Build agentic workflows for procurement analysis parsing RFP responses, surfacing schedule risks, and flagging vendor compliance gaps against programme requirements.
• Develop AI tooling for accelerator subsystem commissioning support, including anomaly detection, parameter sweep analysis, and real‑time operational monitoring interfaces.

Regulatory & Infrastructure Tooling

• Partner with the regulatory team to build AI-assisted tools for documentation drafting, compliance cross-referencing, and submission preparation.
• Contribute to internal tooling infrastructure: version control for design artifacts, automated validation and consistency checking, and documentation generation.
• Identify and pursue the highest-value workflow automation opportunities across the Energy Amplifier island and accelerator design workstreams and develop a spin‑out thesis around the most promising software you build.

QUALIFICATIONS

Required

• You have built something real: a company, a product, a platform used by domain experts at scale. Founder, CTO, early technical hire.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals: Python and/or TypeScript, clean architecture, version control, testing, and production‑quality code standards.
• Demonstrated experience building with LLMs: prompt engineering, RAG architectures, agent frameworks (LangChain, LlamaIndex, or equivalent), and API integration.
• Comfort working with geometry, spatial data, or engineering file formats (CAD, STEP, mesh, simulation outputs).
• High agency: you identify problems, propose solutions, and execute without needing a detailed spec. This is a build role, not a research role.
• Excellent communication with non-software collaborators you can explain a technical constraint to a mechanical engineer and absorb domain knowledge quickly.

Preferred

• Experience with CAD systems or geometric modeling libraries: OpenCascade, FreeCAD, Fusion 360, SolidWorks, NX, or similar.
• Prior work on systems with physical-world consequences: robotics, aerospace, energy, biotech, or advanced manufacturing.
• Background in or exposure to nuclear, aerospace, or defense regulatory environments and the documentation standards they demand.
• Experience with knowledge graph construction, semantic search, or structured document extraction from engineering specifications.

BENEFITS

Compensation: Competitive salary commensurate with experience, plus meaningful equity in SSI with structured spin‑out terms for the right opportunity.

Benefits: We offer health, dental, and vision insurance, direct access to leadership, and the chance to work on one of the most consequential clean energy projects of the decade with a real path to building the next company on top of it.

LOCATION & WORK POLICY

The primary location is Austin, Texas. Our facility is located next to Austin Airport. We are open to candidates who prefer to split their time between Austin and another location, or who are willing to relocate.