Founding Software Engineer - Fullstack Developer (AI Startup)

On any given Tuesday, our platform might be handling RFPs for satellite companies, automating Security Questions for Silicon Valley unicorns, or summarising thousands of documents for Wall Street's biggest funds. Built model-agnostic from day one, deployed across 44 countries, growing 15% monthly. All with 4 engineers.

When was the last time Brisbane had a genuine shot at building a global enterprise AI platform?

Position Summary

We're hiring a Founding Software Engineer. Not "founding" as a vanity title. Founding as in: the decisions you make in the next 12 months will define how this platform operates for the next decade.

You'll build across our Vue.js frontend and Node.js backend, push the limits of what LLMs can do in production, and have a direct hand in shaping our engineering organisation from the ground up.

Your Mission

AutoRFP.ai is at the stage where every engineer is a multiplier. We're past the "will this work?" phase and deep into the "how do we scale this globally?" phase. You'll build systems that need to understand context, maintain accuracy at scale, and deliver real automation to Fortune 500 companies.

This is the role for someone who's thought about starting their own thing. You get the upside of building something from scratch - architecture decisions, culture, processes, hiring - without the founder risk of personally guaranteeing a lease and making payroll.

In your first week you can expect to:

• Ship a PR to production (preferably on your first day - we set everything up for your success from day 1)
• Dive deep into the codebase and start forming opinions about where we need to go
• Meet the team and understand our customer problems firsthand

In your first month you can expect to:

• Own your first feature from scoping through deployment
• Work directly with customers to understand their workflows and pain points
• Start identifying architectural decisions that will compound over the next 12 months

In your first three months you can expect to:

• Lead implementation of a major feature or architectural initiative
• Influence our development processes, technical standards, and how we think about quality
• Be proposing systemic fixes to second-order problems nobody asked you to look at

In your first six months you can expect to:

• Drive technical initiatives that directly impact customer experience and business metrics
• Help scale our architecture to support rapid international growth
• Shape how we hire and what our engineering culture looks like at 10, 20, 50 engineers

What we're looking for

• Production engineering experience - You've built systems real customers depend on. You know what breaks at scale and you've been the one to fix it.
• Full-stack capability - Comfortable across Vue.js and Node.js. You can pick up any part of the stack and make it better.
• Ownership mentality - You don't wait to be told what to build. You see the problem, scope the solution, and ship it. Then you measure whether it worked.
• Systems thinking - You don't patch symptoms. You notice patterns, trace root causes, and build solutions that prevent entire categories of problems.
• Strong opinions, loosely held - You'll defend your technical position with evidence and reasoning. But once a decision is made, you commit fully and make it work.
• Builder's instinct - You have opinions about what we should build next. You think about the product, the business, the customers - not just the code.

We particularly value experience with document processing, enterprise SaaS, search systems, or production LLM applications. But what we really care about is whether you can operate with the autonomy and judgment this stage demands.

The Culture

We've built a team of people who are genuinely good at what they do. We give direct feedback, ask hard questions, and trust each other to deliver. When things break, we own it and fix it together. When we ship something great, we celebrate.

This isn't a place to coast. But if you want to build something that matters - and have the fingerprints to prove it - you'll love it here.

Location & Office

Brisbane CBD. You'll work 5 days in office with flexibility for appointments.

Tech Stack

• Vue.js frontend, TypeScript Node.js backend
• Firebase Database and Authentication
• AWS Cloud Infrastructure
• Nx monorepo, Terraform, GitHub Actions
• Daily releases, emphasis on automated testing

Compensation

$110,000-$170,000 base + super + performance bonus

Equipment includes latest MacBooks, 49" screens, and any software that makes you more effective. Monthly team lunches, annual off-sites, and future opportunities to visit our global offices.

Apply: https://autorfp.ai/careers/founding-software-eng