Founding Product Engineer
- Role
- Fullstack
- Experience
- Senior
- Employment
- Full-time
- Company size
- Startup
Open to DE, AT only · UTC+1…UTC+2. Set where you work from to check your eligibility.
No BS summary
Founding Product Engineer needed with 3+ years of experience delivering end-to-end software features. Must have strong full-stack proficiency in Node.js, TypeScript, NestJS, and React. Native-level German is essential. Role involves customer contact, product discovery, and full-stack development.
Core skills
Required skills
Optional skills
Required languages
ABOUT THE ROLE
We're a seed-stage AI voice communication startup headquartered in Vienna, Austria, building an AI phone assistant platform used by thousands of small and medium-sized businesses across Europe. Our product automates inbound and outbound calls, appointment scheduling, customer service inquiries, and more — with a strong focus on the German-speaking market and European data sovereignty.
As a Founding Product Engineer, you'll take end-to-end ownership of product features — from hypothesis and prototype through to production. You'll work at the intersection of engineering and product, keeping close contact with customers and partners to ship pragmatic, high-impact software fast. This is a high-ownership, high-autonomy role at a fast-growing company.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
- Own features end-to-end: from discovery and hypothesis through architecture, implementation, and release.
- Lead product discovery by rapidly designing and running experiments to validate ideas before investing in large-scale builds.
- Maintain close, recurring contact with customers, partners, and the Sales team to surface real pain points and translate them into product decisions.
- Design and implement tracking and metrics instrumentation to support data-driven iteration.
- Build across the full stack, driving architecture decisions and owning implementation through to production.
- Balance speed of validation with long-term scalability in every solution you ship.
- Take radical ownership of initiatives — move things forward independently without waiting for sign-offs.
WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR
Must-haves (dealbreakers):
- 3+ years of experience in Product Engineering, delivering end-to-end software features.
- Strong full-stack proficiency with Node.js, TypeScript, NestJS, and React.
- Native-level German language proficiency (Deutsch auf Muttersprache-Niveau) — essential for supporting our German-language product and customer base.
Required skills:
- Experience integrating software with external systems such as CRMs, calendar applications, and databases.
- Ability to gather and synthesize customer feedback into actionable product decisions, working closely with customers, partners, and sales.
- Comfort identifying, tracking, and analyzing relevant product metrics to drive data-informed decisions.
- Proven experience with the full software development lifecycle — from architecture decisions through to production release.
Nice to have:
- Experience integrating AI/LLM features (e.g., OpenAI or similar) into production software.
- Familiarity with GDPR compliance and EU AI Act considerations in product development.
- Experience thriving in a remote-first, asynchronous collaboration environment.
COMPENSATION & BENEFITS
- Salary: €80,000 – €120,000 annually, depending on experience.
- Equity: Meaningful equity stake as an early team member.
- Remote-first setup with optional access to a Vienna office.
- High-autonomy, high-impact role at an early-stage, fast-scaling company.
LOCATION
This is a fully remote role, open to candidates based in Germany (primary) or Austria. You should have meaningful overlap with Central European Time (CET). Visa sponsorship is not available.
What you'll do
- Own features end-to-end: from discovery and hypothesis through architecture, implementation, and release.
- Lead product discovery by rapidly designing and running experiments to validate ideas before investing in large-scale builds.
- Maintain close, recurring contact with customers, partners, and the Sales team to surface real pain points and translate them into product decisions.
- Design and implement tracking and metrics instrumentation to support data-driven iteration.
- Build across the full stack, driving architecture decisions and owning implementation through to production.
- Balance speed of validation with long-term scalability in every solution you ship.
- Take radical ownership of initiatives — move things forward independently without waiting for sign-offs.
What they require
- 3+ years of experience in Product Engineering, delivering end-to-end software features.
- Native-level German language proficiency (Deutsch auf Muttersprache-Niveau) — essential for supporting our German-language product and customer base.
- Ability to gather and synthesize customer feedback into actionable product decisions, working closely with customers, partners, and sales.
- Comfort identifying, tracking, and analyzing relevant product metrics to drive data-informed decisions.
- Proven experience with the full software development lifecycle — from architecture decisions through to production release.
- Experience thriving in a remote-first, asynchronous collaboration environment.
Benefits
- Meaningful equity stake as an early team member.
- Remote-first setup with optional access to a Vienna office.
- High-autonomy, high-impact role at an early-stage, fast-scaling company.
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