Navii is working with a stealth-mode, early-stage startup — founded by a team of ex-Google leaders — to help them hire a Senior Founding Software Engineer. The company is building the systems that power a new monetization platform, and this is a first ~10 employees role: you'll help shape the technical foundation, engineering bar, and execution culture from the ground up, partnering directly with the founders on architecture and hiring.
Compensation:
$160,000–$220,000 + meaningful early-stage equity
*(Also a fit if you call yourself: Backend Engineer, Infrastructure Engineer, or Systems Engineer.)*
What you'll do
- Low-latency serving & decisioning — request handling, ranking, and auction flows that stay fast under real traffic
- Delivery infrastructure customers can rely on — targeting, pacing, campaign management, and the plumbing that turns decisions into outcomes
- Measurement that doesn\'t lie — attribution, reporting, incrementality, and experimentation systems built for correctness and operational sanity
- Platform architecture for performance & reliability — scalability and throughput where latency and correctness are both non-negotiable
- AI-accelerated engineering — use AI to speed up design, debugging, and iteration while keeping engineering judgment intact
What you\'ll need
- Strong computer science fundamentals, and the ability to turn them into production-grade systems
- Proven backend + distributed systems experience, especially in high-throughput environments
- Experience building or scaling low-latency, high-QPS systems with real operational ownership
- Production engineering and debugging depth — you protect correctness even when speed is tempting
- Ability to own a technical component end-to-end, from design through rollout and ongoing reliability
Bonus points
- Experience with ads / monetization infrastructure (serving, auctions, targeting, measurement/attribution)
- Experience building experimentation or measurement platforms at scale