Early-stage startups are unlike any other customer. Founders are moving fast, resources are tight, and the technical decisions they make today can either unlock their growth or become a bottleneck six months from now. Many of these companies are coming straight out of top accelerators or are freshly backed by leading VC firms, and they need a trusted technical advisor in their corner. This is where you come in.
In this role, you'll work directly with early-stage founders across a wide range of industries including Media & Entertainment, AI/ML, FinTech, ClimateTech, Healthcare & Life Sciences, Consumer, B2B SaaS, and more. You'll help them make smart, pragmatic architectural decisions that set them up to move fast without creating problems down the road. You'll build real, lasting relationships with these founders and establish yourself as one of the first trusted technical voices in their journey.
You won't be handing founders a generic playbook. On any given week you might be helping a first-time founder think through their architecture before they've written a single line of code, helping a seed-stage company figure out how to scale after an unexpected viral launch, or working through a compliance challenge with a FinTech startup that needs to move quickly but can't afford to cut corners.
Beyond your direct work with founders, you'll have dedicated time to stay sharp and keep your technical skills current. You'll also serve as a voice for the startups you work with, advocating internally to make sure the right products and features are being built for their needs. And you'll have plenty of opportunities to share your expertise more broadly by writing technical content and presenting at startup and developer events across Southern California's ecosystem.
Key job responsibilities
- Work hands-on with early-stage founders to design and iterate on architectures that are practical for where they are today but built to scale as they grow
- Help startups navigate the fast-moving GenAI landscape, from selecting the right foundation models and AI services to building production-ready AI-powered products and services
- Guide founders through the real challenges of building GenAI applications, including managing model costs, latency, accuracy, safety, and AI best practices
- Support startups in building the right data foundations to power their AI products, whether that's vector databases, data pipelines, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), or fine-tuning workflows
- Build and deepen relationships within Southern California's startup ecosystem, including top accelerators, incubators, and leading VC firms
- Be a voice for your founders, connecting their feedback and needs directly to product and engineering teams to help shape the tools and services being built for them
- Create technical content tailored to early-stage startups, such as blog posts, reference architectures, and sample code, that helps founders move faster and spend less time reinventing the wheel
- Share your expertise at startup events, demo days, and developer meetups across the Southern California ecosystem to build trust and visibility in the community
BASIC QUALIFICATIONS
- 8+ years of specific technology domain areas (e.g. software development, cloud computing, systems engineering, infrastructure, security, networking, data & analytics) experience
- 3+ years of design, implementation, or consulting in applications and infrastructures experience
- 10+ years of IT development or implementation/consulting in the software or Internet industries experience
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS
- 10+ years of infrastructure architecture, database architecture and networking experience
- Experience working with end user or developer communities
The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits.
USA, CA, Irvine - 153,600.00 - 207,800.00 USD annually
USA, CA, Santa Monica - 153,600.00 - 207,800.00 USD annually
