Founding Engineer

Alexander Chapman; New York (NY); On-site; USD 170,000 - 270,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental & vision coverage

Gym stipend

Catered lunch & dinner

Quarterly offsites

Equity

Job summary

Alexander Chapman is seeking a Founding Software Engineer to own core infrastructure powering its AI agents and products. You’ll work across distributed systems, AI infrastructure, reliability, and developer tooling.

Join a fast-growing AI startup with true founding-level ownership, NYC-based or open to relocation, and a path to shape architecture and engineering culture with equity and strong compensation.

Qualifications

• 4+ years building production software.
• Strong TypeScript and SQL proficiency.
• Experience with distributed systems and production reliability.
• High agency with ownership mentality.
• Comfortable in a fast-moving startup environment.
• Experience in regulated or security-sensitive environments is a plus.
• NYC-based or willing to relocate.

Responsibilities

• Own critical infrastructure powering AI agents and products.
• Work across distributed systems, AI infrastructure, reliability and developer tooling.
• Address agent execution, tool orchestration, and session lifecycle needs.
• Lead architecture discussions and influence engineering culture.
• Ensure reliability, observability, and fault-tolerant design.

Skills

TypeScript

SQL

Distributed systems

Reliability

Job description

We’re working with a fast-growing AI startup building intelligent agents that automate complex, high-volume workflows in a massive industry.

The company has achieved significant early traction, is already working with major enterprise customers, and is backed by leading investors. The founding team comes from top-tier technical and academic backgrounds, and the company is now expanding its engineering team with a small number of exceptional builders.

This is a chance to join early and help build the infrastructure behind a platform with the potential to fundamentally transform how an entire industry operates.

The Role

As a Founding Software Engineer, you’ll own critical infrastructure powering the company’s AI agents and products.

You’ll work across distributed systems, AI infrastructure, reliability, and developer tooling, including:

• Agent execution, tool orchestration, and session lifecycle
• Provider routing, failover, cost optimization, and latency
• Evaluation infrastructure and regression detection
• CI/CD, internal tooling, and AI-native developer workflows
• Reliability, observability, and fault-tolerant systems

You’ll work closely with the founding team, have significant architectural ownership, and help define how the engineering organization operates.

What We’re Looking For

• 4+ years building production software
• Strong TypeScript + SQL
• Experience with distributed systems and production reliabilityComfortable with retries, circuit breakers, observability, and graceful degradation
• High agency and strong ownership mentality
• Comfortable operating in an ambiguous, fast-moving startup
• Experience in regulated or security-sensitive environments is a plus
• NYC-based or willing to relocate

Why Join?

• True founding-level ownership
• Build core infrastructure for production AI agents
• Work directly with an experienced, highly technical founding team
• Join an AI-native engineering environment
• Significant opportunity to shape architecture, product, and engineering culture
• Massive market with substantial room for AI-driven transformation
• Competitive $170K–$270K + equity
• Full medical, dental & vision coverage, gym stipend, catered lunch & dinner, and quarterly offsites

If you want to be one of the engineers defining the technical foundation of a high-growth AI company, this is an opportunity worth exploring.