AI-first Founding Engineer F/M/D

The engineer of yesterday is obsolete. We're looking for the engineer of tomorrow.

The way we build software has fundamentally, irreversibly changed. The old playbooks are being rewritten in real-time by LLMs, agents, and new AI-native architectures.

At Tekkr, we believe that an "AI-first" mindset isn't a feature; it's the foundation . If your first instinct for a new problem isn't "How can I leverage AI to solve this?" you are not right for this job. Please don't apply.

Our mission: What if… your work empowered tech teams across the world?

Software helps address the world’s biggest challenges from climate crisis to inefficiency in governments. However, many companies and teams are bogged down by their own inefficiencies and struggle to develop technology effectively. Tekkr’s mission is to empower tech teams and their leaders to achieve their full potential! Join tekkr and become a positive multiplier for techies across the globe!

We work primarily with other, cutting-edge startups (Parloa, Orbem, Forto, Vimcar...) and help them get even further ahead. So not only will you work with a kick-ass Tekkr team, but also get real-life exposure to amazing customers and collaborate with their tech leadership on some of their most exciting challenges.

We have built an initial software product based on node.js, react, mongoDB, shadcn and modern AI-tooling (e.g. RAG, langfuse, ...). We are using this product to run real customer engagements and projects to deeply explore customer problems. Our goal: build something people want! We learn super-fast, iterate very quickly and need your help to become even faster! Let's build this company together!

Tasks

Your mission: architect, augment, accelerate

This isn't a "ticket-taker" role. You are a Full-Stack Founding Engineer . You will co-own the product, the culture, and the technical vision. Your job is to find and build leverage.

• Full stack development skills, ideally in the Tekkr stack: node, react, mongoDB
• Architect AI-native systems: You won't just "add AI" to an old product. You will design and build systems that start with AI. You'll build, test, and deploy autonomous agents, RAG pipelines and LLM-powered workflows as core product components.
• Operate at 10x leverage: You will use AI as your primary co-developer, not just a syntax-checker. Your first question for any task isn't "How do I build this?" but "How do I get AI to build 80% of this, so I can focus on the critical 20%?"
• Full-spectrum ownership: Take ideas from a conversation with a customer's stakeholder to a deployed, AI-powered solution. You will architect, design (with shadcn), build, and iterate at a pace that traditional teams would call impossible.
• Shape the future: As a founding engineer, your voice will directly influence our product roadmap, our engineering culture, and our ultimate success.

Requirements

Hard requirements:

• Full professional proficiency in English, German is a plus
• Berlin-based, we want to start building a local team, then expand for remote work for all
• European work permit required

Who you are: the AI-first operator

We are not hiring for a list of "skills." We are hiring for a mindset.

• You think in "Leverage," not "Lines of Code." You are obsessed with efficiency. You'd rather spend two hours crafting a complex prompt-chain that saves 20 hours of manual coding than just "getting it done" the old way.
• You are fluent in modern AI. You've already built non-trivial projects with LLMs. You know what RAG is and why it matters. You've played with agentic frameworks. You've built Simulations & Evaluations.
• You are a pragmatic prototyper. You have a "ship it" mentality. You know that a 90% solution powered by AI, delivered today, is better than a 99% solution built manually, delivered next month.
• You are a systems thinker. You understand that AI isn't just a feature; it's a new, unpredictable layer of the stack. You can reason about vector databases, context windows, and API costs just as easily as you can about a REST API.
• You are entrepreneurial. This is the core "startup attitude." You've built your own projects, freelanced, or run a community. You know how to finish and get real-world feedback.

Stack

We care more about your ability to learn and integrate than your mastery of one framework. Here are things we use:

• Core AI: LLM-native architectures, RAG, agentic systems, vector databases, and AI observability
• Application layer: Node.js, React, MongoDB.
• Design/UX: Ability to implement simple, effective designs using shadcn .

Benefits

• Highly attractive equity compensation based on industry benchmarks
• Salary starting with at least 65.000€/ year up to 100.000€/ year
• Join a team that has already established rapport with 50+ investors including Sequoia, Accel, Kleiner Perkins, Northzone, FoundersFund, Index Ventures + many leading German VCs like Earlybird, Holtzbrinck, …

Team

• Tekkr is built by techies for techies!
• At our core, we are in love with improvement, learning and growth. We believe things can always be done better!
• You will work directly with the founder Philipp Römer who was previously VP product at forto leading the development of software solutions for global trade, driving the company growth from 80 to >850 forties and achieve a 2bn$ valuation as part of forto's top management team.
• You will also work closely with Barzel Segal, previously EVP Engineering at forto and long-time Silicon Valley tech leader (Workday, Identified, Mindjet…) and Jackie Moyes (ex-VP product at Viacom and Yara)

The hiring process

• VIDEO CALL (30m) - Chat about your background to ensure the role is a good fit + give you an opportunity to ask questions about Tekkr!
• FOUNDER CALL (30m) - Chat about your role as a founding engineer, your motivation and the opportunities at Tekkr
• TAKE-HOME PROJECT [2-3 HR] - Evaluate your technical skills and problem-solving approach through a real-life project based on the Tekkr context
• PROJECT REVIEW [1 HR] - Review your project with the Tekkr tech team (Engineering & Product)

TRIAL - DAY / ONSITE IF POSSIBLE

• Our trial day is meant to simulate what working at Tekkr is like as closely as possible. We love candidates that have researched the space and come prepared with questions about Tekkr.