Software Engineer (SF)

Fractional AI•San Francisco, CA

1d•Hybrid

About The Position

Fractional AI is a startup in the heart of Silicon Valley targeting the biggest greenfield opportunity in the economy: transforming companies with AI software at a scale the market is only beginning to understand. Our clients include Zapier, Airbyte, and companies from industries ranging from data infrastructure to healthcare and life sciences. We were founded by repeat founders Chris Taylor, Eddie Siegel, and Travis May (Founder of Datavant, $7B exit), and are backed by Shaper Capital. Most of our engineers are former founders or staff engineers from top tech companies like Google and Stripe. We're headquartered in SF with additional offices in NYC, Raleigh-Durham, and Dubai. This role is designed for strong software engineers who want to ship AI products end-to-end across a range of domains, with meaningful ownership from day one. You'll work on a small, high-caliber team (2–5 engineers and a PM) building AI products for our clients, from requirements gathering and prototyping through system design, development, testing, and deployment. You’ll own features end-to-end, and develop domain expertise across a range of AI use cases. You'll spend most of your time in code, with meaningful client exposure – frequently interacting with the client’s team to make sure what we're building meets their needs. Most engineers take a decade to see this range of hard problems across this many domains. Here, you'll do it in your first year. To make this possible, we are religious about being the best company in the world to learn Applied AI engineering practices.

Requirements

Experience consistently shipping high visibility or high impact software, with deep care for the craft.
4+ years of experience (or exceptional signals elsewhere like AI evangelism, OSS contributions, founder experience).
Specific interest in applying software engineering fundamentals to AI systems.
Comfort talking with senior technical stakeholders.
High ownership mindset.
Low ego, high integrity.

Nice To Haves

AI evangelism
OSS contributions
Founder experience

Responsibilities

Ship AI products end-to-end across a range of domains, with meaningful ownership from day one.
Work on a small, high-caliber team (2–5 engineers and a PM) building AI products for clients.
Manage the full product lifecycle: requirements gathering, prototyping, system design, development, testing, and deployment.
Own features end-to-end.
Develop domain expertise across a range of AI use cases.
Spend most of your time in code.
Interact frequently with clients to ensure built products meet their needs.
Apply software engineering fundamentals to AI systems.
Balance frontier model capabilities with good system design.
Talk with senior technical stakeholders and navigate conversations skillfully.
Jump in without instruction, embrace a "no job too big, no job too small" mindset.
Shape strategy and culture.
Help others and ask for help.
Apply standard software engineering discipline to the non-deterministic world of frontier AI.
Design systems around testable hypotheses.
Curate durable data sets.
Ensure shipped products keep working long after handover.
Ship two to three products per year and learn from dozens more.
Have outsized autonomy on each product.
Spend constant time on the frontier of models and tooling.
Develop a muscle for AI product development.
Experiment with the latest tools and share learnings with teammates.