Protocol Solutions Engineer

Etherealize; Austin (TX); On-site; USD 180,000 - 280,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, vision coverage

401(k)

Generous PTO

Job summary

Etherealize in Austin is seeking a senior engineer to own the build-on-top of a privacy protocol. You’ll solve hard problems in unfamiliar territory, working with an on-chain privacy stack and DeFi integrations.

You’ll collaborate with protocol leads and CTO, adapt to new environments, and shape patterns for future engineers while aligning with US/European hours.

Qualifications

• Senior engineer or security researcher with deep familiarity with the EVM, Solidity and DeFi.
• Ability to work in novel, non-standard programming environments and build from first principles.
• Experience with ZK / Privacy protocols; ZK expertise not required.
• Strong protocol thinking and problem‑solving ability with incomplete information.
• Willingness to work US or European hours to collaborate with the team.

Responsibilities

• Build privacy-native DeFi applications on top of a new protocol, turning requirements into working solutions.
• Collaborate with external partners to integrate with the privacy infrastructure and tailor components.
• Design and implement DeFi integrations bridging private environments with public Ethereum.

Skills

EVM

Solidity

DeFi

ZK / Privacy

System design

Novel environments

Tools

Rust

ZK tooling

Job description

Why Etherealize?

Etherealize is building the rails to bring Wall Street into the 21st century. Today's financial infrastructure wastes billions in trapped capital and operational inefficiency, forcing institutions to maintain massive reserves, limiting market liquidity, and creating systemic risk that grows more dangerous as markets become increasingly global and interconnected.

With $40M in funding from Electric Capital and Paradigm, we are bringing together the best minds from Ethereum and Wall Street to rebuild the infrastructure that underpins the financial system — faster, safer, fully on-chain.

Why This Role Exists

Our team has spent the past year building our core privacy protocol: a Rust and ZK codebase that underpins everything else Etherealize does. That protocol is now maturing into a stable foundation, and the work is shifting from building the protocol itself to building on top of it.

Today that build-on-top work is split across our protocol leads and CTO. We are hiring someone to own it. This is not a cryptography role, and we are not looking for another ZK researcher.

We are looking for an exceptional engineer who thrives when handed a new, unusual programming environment and asked to make something real with it; the kind of person who would have been among the first to build a DeFi application on an experimental new protocol and enjoyed working out the first answers.

What Will You Do?

We're in the fortunate situation of having a cool new primitive and a lineup of clients who are ready to put their assets on top of it. Your job is to build the novel applications that will allow these clients to move more of their activity on chain, including:

Privacy Native DeFi: Translating traditional financial infrastructure into privacy native onchain protocols, architecting and building the ultimate solutions to unlock these markets.

External Partner Solutions: Working with partners to integrate with our privacy infrastructure, building custom components to solve their needs.

DeFi Integrations: Building bridges between our private environment and the rest of public Ethereum; understanding existing protocols and how they can be used as legos to solve client needs.

Who Are You?

You are an engineer who has proven you can solve genuinely hard problems in unfamiliar territory. You have lived in EVM environments, but what sets you apart is not knowing Solidity syntax well, it is being able to think about a protocol, make hard design decisions, and keep up when the usual patterns stop applying.

Required

A track record as a senior engineer or security researcher with deep familiarity with the EVM, Solidity and DeFi.

Demonstrated ability to work in novel, non-standard programming environments and build from first principles rather than pattern-matching.

Experience working with ZK / Privacy protocols, or comfort learning the quirks of a new protocol. ZK expertise is not required.

Strong protocol thinking and raw problem-solving ability, and the judgment to make sound design decisions with incomplete information.

Willingness to work US or European hours to collaborate closely with the team.

What's In It For You?

Blank-sheet problems with real clients attached. Major institutions are already moving large volumes of assets into our privacy environment, and there is a queue of things to build around them: privacy-native lending, custom asset implementations, custodian integrations. You turn those needs into working protocols.

First dedicated engineer on a new programming model. Today this work is done personally by our CTO and protocol leads. You take it over, solve problems nobody has solved before, and set the patterns everyone after you follows.

A team you can't fake your way onto. You'll work daily with protocol engineers with deep ZK and cryptography backgrounds, and leadership includes Danny Ryan, who led Ethereum's research through the Merge, and CTO, Zach Obront, who has secured $10B+ in on-chain assets.

Benefits: Medical, dental, and vision healthcare, 401(k), generous PTO, and more. See overview here.

Equal Opportunity

Etherealize values diversity in all its forms. We welcome qualified applicants of every background and identity.