Founding Design Engineer: AI Tools & Design Systems

Sperton Global AS; United States; On-site; USD 150,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

Sperton Global AS in San Francisco is hiring a Founding Design Engineer who will shape the visual language, product experience, and design systems from the ground up. This role blends product design, visual/brand design, and frontend engineering, and you will own end-to-end design across developer-focused workflows, shipping directly in production code within a modern frontend stack.

You’ll work closely with the CEO and engineers, relocate to SF (if needed), and help establish a cohesive design

Qualifications

• 5–10 years of experience spanning product design, visual/brand design, and design engineering.
• Experience as a founding, first, or sole designer at an early-stage startup (Seed–Series B).
• Strong portfolio showcasing visual and product craft.
• Experience owning both product design and brand/marketing design.
• Hands-on experience shipping production frontend UI.
• Strong working knowledge of React and/or Next.js.
• Experience building or extending design systems.
• Proficiency with Figma.
• Comfortable working directly in a production codebase.
• Ability to operate with autonomy and ambiguity.
• Based in San Francisco or willing to relocate.
• Willing to work in the SF office five days a week initially.

Responsibilities

• Own product design end-to-end across complex developer workflows.
• Translate ambiguous problems into intuitive interfaces.
• Collaborate with users and stakeholders to reduce friction.
• Turn designs into production-ready interfaces.
• Build frontend components using React, Next.js, TS, Storybook, Tailwind.
• Develop and maintain the design system foundations.
• Create component libraries, tokens, and UI standards.
• Align brand and product visuals across surfaces.

Skills

Product design

Brand design

Design engineering

React

Next.js

TypeScript

Tailwind CSS

Figma

Design systems

Frontend development

Tools

React

Next.js

TypeScript

Storybook

Tailwind CSS

shadcn

Figma

Job description

Sperton Global AS in San Francisco is hiring a Founding Design Engineer who will shape the visual language, product experience, and design systems from the ground up. This role blends product design, visual/brand design, and frontend engineering, and you will own end-to-end design across developer-focused workflows, shipping directly in production code within a modern frontend stack.

You’ll work closely with the CEO and engineers, relocate to SF (if needed), and help establish a cohesive design