Recruiting from Scratch is a specialized talent firm dedicated to helping companies build exceptional teams. We partner closely with our clients to deeply understand their needs, then connect them with top-tier candidates who are not only highly skilled but also the right fit for the company’s culture and vision. Our mission is simple: place the best people in the right roles to drive long-term success for both clients and candidates.
Location: San Francisco, CA Company Stage of Funding: Seed Stage (Raised $4.5M) Office Type: Hybrid (2–4 Days Per Week In Office) Salary: $175,000–$300,000 + Equity (1–2%)
Company Description
We're representing a venture-backed AI startup building an intelligent product design agent that helps teams explore, refine, and validate product ideas through visual collaboration and AI-powered workflows. Their platform combines generative AI, multimodal systems, and agentic workflows to help product teams move from concept to execution faster than ever before.
Founded by a repeat entrepreneur with leadership experience at Google, HQ Trivia, and multiple successful startups, the company has already attracted thousands of early users and secured $4.5M in funding. They are now hiring a Founding AI/ML Engineer to help build the intelligence layer that powers the next generation of AI-assisted product creation.
What You Will Do
Own the end-to-end development of the company’s AI and machine learning systems, from experimentation through production deployment.
Design, build, and optimize agentic AI workflows that help users generate, refine, and evaluate product ideas and designs.
Develop intelligent systems leveraging LLMs, retrieval pipelines, personalization, recommendation engines, and multimodal AI capabilities.
Select, fine-tune, evaluate, and deploy machine learning models that improve product performance and user outcomes.
Build backend systems and APIs that power AI-driven experiences at scale.
Design evaluation frameworks and feedback loops to continuously improve model quality and user experience.
Collaborate closely with the founder and engineering team to define technical strategy and product direction.
Translate ambiguous product concepts into scalable AI-powered solutions.
Contribute across both machine learning and product engineering, helping bridge research and production systems.
Ideal Background
4+ years of software engineering experience, including significant work on AI or machine learning products.
2+ years of experience building production machine learning systems and shipping customer-facing features.
Experience developing and deploying AI-powered products in startup or high-growth environments.
Strong backend engineering skills with deep experience in TypeScript and Python.
Hands-on experience with PyTorch, TensorFlow, Hugging Face, or related ML frameworks.
Experience building recommendation systems, retrieval architectures, search, ranking, reranking, personalization, memory systems, or vector search applications.
Demonstrated success building 0-to-1 products or major product features.
Strong product intuition and ability to balance technical excellence with user impact.
Comfortable operating independently and taking ownership in an early-stage startup environment.
Preferred
Experience building agentic AI products, autonomous workflows, or AI copilots.
Background at product-focused companies building creative, design, collaboration, or developer tools.
Experience with LLM orchestration frameworks such as LangChain or similar technologies.
Familiarity with vector databases and retrieval systems.
Experience with multimodal AI systems, generative AI products, or creative tooling.
Startup experience, particularly at Seed through Series A stages.
Interest in product design, creativity tools, and AI-assisted workflows.
Compensation and Benefits
Base salary: $175,000–$300,000.
Founding-level equity package ranging from approximately 1–2%.
Opportunity to join a well-funded startup at an early stage and shape core product direction.
Direct partnership with an experienced founder and leadership team.
Hybrid work environment with flexibility and collaboration across San Francisco and New York teams.
High ownership role with significant influence over product, technology, and company strategy.
Opportunity to work on cutting-edge AI, agentic systems, personalization, and multimodal experiences.
Strong career growth potential as one of the earliest technical hires at the company.