Founding Engineer

David Joseph & Company; New York (NY); On-site; USD 180,000 - 250,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Founding equity

Ownership of domain from day one

Job summary

David Joseph & Company is seeking a founding engineer for an on-site, New York-based AI startup building multi-modal agents. You will own a core product domain from day one and ship to production daily alongside a small, high-velocity team in person.

You will work across the stack with TypeScript, Node.js, Next.js, React, and Python, talk directly to customers, and help set architecture, quality bars, and guardrails for non-deterministic systems plus real-time voice and messaging pipelines.

Qualifications

• 3-8 years of full-stack engineering experience.
• Track record shipping a product from zero to one.
• Strong command of TypeScript across the stack (Node.js and React/Next.js).
• Comfortable owning product decisions without a PM and speaking with customers.
• Depth in production voice or SMS agents, long-running agent state, or guardrails.
• Genuine experience building with LLM APIs or agent SDKs.

Responsibilities

• Own a core product domain end-to-end.
• Talk directly to customers and ship work yourself.
• Build and tune multi-modal agents for low-latency voice and messaging.
• Set architecture and guardrails for non-deterministic systems.
• Work across the full stack from frontend to Python services.

Skills

Full-stack engineering

TypeScript

Customer interactions

LLM/agent APIs

Ownership without PM

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS or related

Tools

Node.js

React/Next.js

Python

LiveKit

Deepgram

Redis

Anthropic/OpenAI SDKs

Vercel AI SDK

Job description

New York, NY · On-site (5 days/week) · Full-time
Compensation: $180K - $250K + founding equity

About the Company

Our client is a stealth-stage AI startup building multi-modal agents (voice, SMS, and email) that automate operations end-to-end for a large, under-digitized consumer-services industry. Founded by engineers who previously helped scale high-growth consumer platforms, the team has already found strong early product-market fit and is growing fast. This is an early founding-team seat with the chance to own a full product domain from day one.

Founded 2024 · Small Team · Industry: AI, Marketplace, Consumer, B2B, Education

The Role

As a founding engineer, you'll take full ownership of a core domain, make product calls without a PM, and ship to production daily alongside a small, high-velocity team working in person in New York.

What you'll be doing

• Own a core product domain end-to-end (for example the B2B business platform, the voice/SMS/email agent layer, the underlying data/AI graph, or a new consumer product)
• Talk directly to customers, turn their feedback into product decisions, and ship the work yourself
• Build and tune multi-modal agents for low-latency voice, strong messaging response rates, and durable conversation state across channels
• Set the architecture and quality bar for non-deterministic systems: evals, prompt versioning, guardrails, and drift detection
• Work across the full stack, from React/Next.js on the front end to Node.js services and Python voice pipelines

Tech stack: TypeScript, Node.js, Next.js, React, Python, LiveKit, Deepgram, Redis, plus modern LLM and agent tooling (Anthropic/OpenAI SDKs, Vercel AI SDK, Mastra, Braintrust)

Requirements

• 3-8 years of full-stack engineering experience
• Track record shipping a product from zero to one, whether at a high-growth startup, as a founder, or on a new-product team inside a larger company
• Strong command of TypeScript across the stack (Node.js and React/Next.js)
• Comfortable owning product decisions without a PM, including speaking directly with customers
• Real, hands-on depth in at least one relevant area: production voice or SMS agents, long-running agent state and memory, B2B2C or marketplace products, or agent evaluation and guardrails
• Genuine product experience building with LLM APIs or agent SDKs (not tutorials or thin wrappers)

Nice to Haves

• Prior experience as a founder or at an accelerator-backed startup that gained real traction, with the perspective to reflect on what worked and what didn't
• Degree from a strong computer science program (weighed more heavily for candidates at the earlier-career end of the range)
• Python experience with real-time voice pipelines (LiveKit, Deepgram, STT/TTS) or with evaluation tooling

Why Join

• Join at the founding stage and own an entire domain from day one
• Work directly with an experienced founding team in a fast-moving, high-ownership environment
• Strong early traction in a large market with room to grow into leadership or stay on a deep IC track
• Competitive salary plus meaningful founding equity

Details

• Location: New York, NY
• Work policy: On-site, 5 days/week
• Compensation: $180K - $250K + equity
• Visa sponsorship: Open to visa transfers (e.g. OPT, H-1B transfers)
• Employment type: Full-time