Founding Engineer

Clera

• $200K — $300K *
Enterprise Technology
Less than 5 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • Prior experience as a founding engineer or early engineering hire at a startup.
  • Proven ability to take product features from concept to production.
  • Full-stack development skills covering both backend and frontend.
  • Strong backend engineering experience, especially with data ingestion and schema design.
  • Hands-on experience deploying LLMs in operational contexts.
  • Demonstrated upward career progression with increasing responsibility.
  • Enthusiastic about navigating the challenges of an early-stage startup.

Responsibilities

  • Build backend systems for processing messy documents from customers.
  • Develop LLM agents for complex compliance documentation.
  • Take ownership of features throughout the entire development cycle.
  • Iterate quickly based on user feedback rather than prolonged discussions.
  • Collaborate closely with founding team on technical and strategic decisions.

Benefits

  • Strong opportunities for equity participation.
  • Direct influence on product direction and company strategy.
  • Work in a dynamic, hands-on startup environment.
  • Opportunity to contribute to pioneering AI solutions in B2B SaaS.
  • Exposure to cutting-edge technologies like LLMs and cloud services.
Full Job Description
About the Role

You'll join a small founding engineering team as an early hire, working directly with the founders on every major decision at an AI-native B2B SaaS startup serving industrial ingredient manufacturers. The product spans document ingestion, LLM agents, and compliance workflows, and your work will touch everything from backend pipelines to user-facing interfaces.
What You'll Do
  • Build backend systems that ingest and process messy real-world documents from customer ERPs and inboxes.
  • Develop LLM agents that complete complex, multi-page compliance and food safety documents.
  • Own features end to end across the full stack, picking up whatever the company needs next.
  • Ship fast and iterate directly on real user feedback rather than extended architecture debate.
  • Work daily alongside the founding team on product direction, technical decisions, and company strategy.
What We're Looking For
  • Prior experience as a founding engineer, founder, or early engineering hire (first 1 to 5 engineers) at a seed or Series A startup.
  • Clear 0-to-1 ownership: you have built and shipped production products or major features end to end, not primarily maintained existing systems.
  • Full-stack range, able to take a feature from backend service through to the UI without waiting for a specialist.
  • Strong backend engineering: services that ingest and process real-world data, plus relational schema design (Postgres or equivalent).
  • LLM and agent work that has run in production, not just demos or experiments.
  • A high career slope: each role shows increasing ownership, scope, and impact.
  • Huge drive and genuine appetite for the ambiguous, hands-on early-startup path.
  • Based in the San Francisco Bay Area or clearly willing to relocate.
  • Familiarity with a JVM backend (Kotlin and Spring Boot preferred, but strong engineers on other stacks are expected to pick it up), React and Next.js on the frontend, Postgres, and a major cloud provider (GCP, AWS, or Azure).
  • Experience integrating multiple model providers (such as Gemini, Anthropic, or OpenAI) into production systems is a plus.
  • Side projects, open-source work, or independently launched products are a strong signal.
  • No degree or years-of-experience requirement.
Compensation & Benefits

Base salary: $200,000 to $300,000 annually. Equity: 0.5% to 2.0%. Visa sponsorship is not available.
Location

Fully on-site, five days a week in San Francisco, California.

Similar Jobs

More Jobs at Clera

More Enterprise Technology Jobs

Find similar Founding Engineer jobs: