Forward Deployed Software Engineer, Applied AI - Frontier AI Lab

Skyrocket Ventures; New York (NY); Hybrid; USD 150,000 - 250,000; Full time

Job summary

Skyrocket Ventures is hiring a Forward Deployed Software Engineer, Applied AI for Frontier AI Lab in New York. You will split time between in‑office customer work and remote collaboration, embedding with client teams to ship AI-driven solutions.

In this early-stage, high-autonomy role you will spend most of your time coding in Python on backend systems while aligning with research developments and customer needs, tackling hard problems at the frontier of AI.

Qualifications

• Passion for AI across research, models, and deployments.
• Comfortable talking with customers as well as using a CLI.
• Strong engineering skills with a product-focused mindset.
• Rigorous, creative thinker who solves previously unsolved problems.
• Excellent attention to detail and fast learner.

Responsibilities

• Serving 1–2 customers, productizing research for them.
• Embed with customer teams to integrate data and systems.
• Work with Research to inform ongoing initiatives.
• In-office 3+ days/week; some periods 100% remote.
• Backend engineering focus with Python and AI.
• Operate with autonomy and creativity to solve tough problems.

Skills

AI obsession

Customer interaction

Problem solving

Detail oriented

Tools

Python

Job description

Forward Deployed Software Engineer, Applied AI - Frontier AI Lab

Location: New York, NY. In office on average 3x/week; you will split your time between working remotely and being in-office at customers’ offices.

The company is a stealth AI neo-lab building and training massively multi-agent, self-improving systems.

The company is creating the world’s most intelligent AI systems, and utilizing their technology to solve the world’s hardest and most valuable problems.

The company has raised a very large round of Series A funding from various investors including one of the leading foundation model companies, top early‑stage investors, and prominent hedge fund and investment firm leaders.

The company has about 20 employees including 7 researchers and 10 engineers. The team is composed of leading researchers from OpenAI, Google DeepMind, Meta, Stanford and Oxford working alongside thousands of AI agents.

The company will pay up to $250k plus equity which could be lucrative.

Job Responsibilities

• Serving 1‑2 customers of the company at a time, taking the Research team’s developments and productizing them for those customers.
• Customers are mostly financial firms and software companies.
• Embedding with your customers, working hand‑in‑hand with their teams to integrate their existing data, preferences, and systems into the company's products; developing new products specifically for them; and collaborating with the Research team to inform ongoing initiatives.
• Schedules will vary, but expect steady‑state of in‑customer‑office 3+ days/week and remote the remainder; during project kick‑offs it will be 5 days/week, and during other periods it may be 100% remote.
• On some customers you will be the sole FDE; on others you may be working with up to 3‑5 others.
• Typically spending 80‑90% of your time writing code, and the remainder talking to customers. The company runs largely async for internal matters, aside from occasional deep time together.
• Engineering will mostly be backend engineering, with Python and AI.
• Being at the absolute frontier of AI developments and deployments and serving as one of the company's earliest FDEs.
• Operating with an exceptional degree of autonomy, efficiency, and creativity.
• Customers will expect you to solve their hardest problems.

Qualifications

• Experience demonstrating an obsession with AI at every level, from the latest developments in research, models, and harnesses to Claude Code’s new features.
• Equally comfortable talking to customers as you are in front of a CLI.
• Top‑tier pure engineering skills coupled with strong product sensibility.
• Rigorous, creative thinker who enjoys figuring out previously‑unsolved problems.
• Strong attention to detail.

Nice to have

• Financial industry or investing experience.
• Experience building and deploying AI systems including agent frameworks, evals, prompt management, and deployment at scale.
• Experience building complex data pipelines, especially in secure or regulated environments.
• Experience doing Forward‑deployed engineering or similar roles.
• Strong in Python.