Senior Forward Deployed Engineer

arra; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 250,000; Full time

Job summary

Confidential is hiring Senior Forward Deployed Engineers for multiple Series B AI startups in San Francisco. You will own deployments end-to-end, build custom integrations, and work closely with customer engineering teams to take products from demo to production.

You’ll lead technical conversations with engineers and executives, contribute to the product roadmap, and participate in pre-sales efforts to scope solutions and proofs of concept.

Qualifications

• 5+ years software engineering experience with 2+ years in a customer-facing role.
• Proficient in Python or TypeScript with production systems experience.
• Experience with cloud platforms, APIs, and data pipelines.
• Able to lead technical conversations with engineers and executives.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end deployments from scoping to launch and ongoing success.
• Build integrations, pipelines, and tooling connecting product to customer data.
• Collaborate with customers’ engineers as a trusted technical partner.
• Join pre-sales conversations to scope solutions and run deep dives.
• Spot deployment patterns and turn them into reusable features.
• Debug production problems in environments you don’t fully control.

Skills

Software engineering

Python

TypeScript

Customer-facing

Cloud infra

APIs

Data pipelines

Leadership

Production systems

Tools

AWS

GCP

Azure

Job description

Confidential: hiring for multiple Series B AI startups

About the opportunity

I work with multiple Series B AI startups that are hiring Senior Forward Deployed Engineers. Each company is post-product-market fit, selling to serious enterprise customers, and needs engineers who can take a product from “promising demo” to “running in production” inside a customer’s environment.

This is a hands-on engineering role. You’ll write real code every week, work directly with customers’ engineering teams, and feed what you learn back into the core product. At this stage, FDEs shape both the product roadmap and how the company sells.

What you’ll do

• Own technical deployments end to end, from scoping and architecture through integration, launch, and ongoing success
• Build custom integrations, pipelines, and tooling that connect the product to customers’ data, systems, and workflows
• Work alongside customers’ engineers and technical leaders as their trusted technical partner
• Join pre-sales conversations to scope solutions, run technical deep dives, and build proofs of concept that close deals
• Spot patterns across deployments and turn them into reusable product features, working closely with the core engineering team
• Debug hard problems in production environments you don’t fully control

What we’re looking for

• 5+ years of software engineering experience, including at least 2 years in a customer-facing technical role (forward deployed engineering, solutions engineering, technical deployment, or similar)
• Strong coding skills in Python or TypeScript, with experience shipping production systems
• Experience with cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP, or Azure), APIs, and data pipelines
• Comfortable leading technical conversations with both engineers and executives
• High ownership: you do whatever it takes to get the customer live

Nice to have

• Experience deploying AI/ML, LLM, or computer vision systems in production
• Startup experience, ideally as an early FDE or solutions engineer
• A background in data infrastructure, developer tools, or enterprise SaaS

Details

• Location: San Francisco, hybrid
• Compensation: $180K–$250K base + meaningful equity (varies by level)