Founding Engineer, Applied AI Lead
equi · New York (on-site) ·
- Work mode
- Hybrid
- Seniority
- Lead
- Category
- AI engineering
- Experience
- 5+ years
equi · New York (on-site) ·
About Equi
Equi is an investment management firm building institutional-quality alternative investment solutions. We operate a unique business model: in addition to offering Equi-branded funds, we build white-label fund-of-funds products for some of the top independent multi-family offices and financial advisory firms in the country. We combine deep manager-selection expertise with sophisticated portfolio construction to deliver differentiated outcomes for our clients and partners.
The firm is at an inflection point. Our AUM is scaling rapidly, we've just launched our largest client since inception (a 9-figure opportunity) and have ~6 more clients that have signed or at the finish line. We're assembling a small, high-caliber team that can grow with the platform and take on increasing responsibility as we scale.
About the Role
Equi is seeking a Founding Engineer and Head of Applied AI to serve as the lead builder across the entire company. This is a foundational leadership role in which you'll design and build the software solutions that accelerate Equi's growth, working across the investment team, operations, and go-to-market.
You will be the backbone of engineering at Equi, driving projects from ideation through execution across AI-powered systems, customer-facing applications, and internal tools. This role sits at the intersection of AI engineering and application development: you'll build RAG-based intelligence systems, automate complex investment workflows, and create new customer-facing applications on top of our data infrastructure.
This is a rare opportunity for someone fascinated by sophisticated investment strategies who wants to build technology that powers a rapidly scaling platform. The role will evolve from hands-on building to eventually growing and leading the engineering team, while maintaining our vision of a small, flat organization where everyone stays close to the work.
Culture
Equi is a team-first environment where transparency and healthy debate are integral to our success. We operate with a flat structure: ideas win on merit, not seniority, and every team member is expected to contribute to the conversation. We value intellectual honesty, rigorous thinking, and the humility to change your mind when the evidence warrants it.
Our vision for engineering is to keep the team small and flat, with everyone remaining involved in building rather than adding layers of management. As the platform scales, there is a clear path to broader responsibility and leadership while staying deeply connected to the technical work.
What You'll Do
Lead Builder Across the Company
Serve as the primary engineer and technical leader, building software solutions that accelerate growth across all teams
Partner directly with the Investment Team, Operations, and GTM to identify high-impact opportunities for technology and automation
Exercise significant autonomy, taking ownership of complex projects from conception through post-launch iteration
Make critical technical decisions and architect scalable solutions for a growing platform
Customer-Facing Applications
Translate complex user needs and business requirements into well-architected, scalable, maintainable, and user-friendly full-stack applications (TypeScript, Next.js, Python, and Postgres on GCP)
Design, implement, and maintain performant and reliable APIs and backend services
Develop exceptional user experiences for clients and partners
AI Engineering
Ingest multi-format investment data and parse it into both human- and machine-digestible formats
Use AI to perform investment analysis and provide recommendations to the human investment team
Build workflows to automate human actions across the investment process
Develop RAG-based intelligence systems to power internal and external applications
Team Leadership & Growth
Act as the backbone of the engineering function, establishing technical direction and best practices
Lead technical decision-making and architectural design discussions
Proactively identify and advocate for process improvements and technology adoption
Eventually grow and lead the engineering team while maintaining hands-on building responsibilities
Who You Are
We are looking for candidates who possess a strong blend of technical depth, product intuition, leadership instincts, and a proactive mindset.
Required
Experience: 5+ years of professional experience in software development, demonstrating progressive responsibility and impact
Passion for Investing: Experience can’t substitute for an innate curiosity and passion for the world of investing. We operate in the depths of it, so you better love it!
Full-Stack Proficiency: Proven track record of designing, building, deploying, operating, and maintaining complex full-stack web applications in production environments. Strong proficiency in TypeScript, Next.js, and Python
Data & Cloud Foundation: Solid understanding of data pipeline concepts (ETL/ELT) and data warehousing principles
AI-Driven Engineering: Competence in AI-driven engineering workflows and the ability to use them to deliver effectively; experience building AI-powered applications
Product Acumen: Demonstrated ability to think critically about product strategy, understand user needs and pain points, and effectively translate them into technical solutions
Autonomy & Action Orientation: Proven ability to work independently with minimal supervision, navigate ambiguity effectively, and drive projects to completion with a strong sense of ownership and a bias toward action
Collaboration & Communication: Excellent verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to articulate complex technical ideas clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences
Leadership Potential: Desire and ability to eventually grow and lead a small, high-performing engineering team
Preferred
Prior experience working in fintech, investment technology, or financial services
Specific experience designing and scaling large-volume data pipelines or complex distributed systems on GCP
Experience using containerization technologies such as Docker and API technologies such as GraphQL
Familiarity with advanced data modeling techniques
Experience with RAG systems, LLM integration, or AI agent development
Defining Our Ideal Candidate: Key Traits in Action
Beyond technical skills, we seek engineers who embody specific traits that are crucial to our culture and success. These qualities are interconnected and define how we approach building impactful products.
Product-Minded
We value engineers who look beyond the code to understand the bigger picture. A product-minded engineer at Equi is deeply curious about the "why": Why are we building this feature? Who is it for? What problem does it solve? They actively engage with stakeholders across the company, offering thoughtful suggestions, constructively challenging assumptions, and proposing alternative approaches based on their technical insight and understanding of user needs. They excel at evaluating the trade-offs between engineering effort and product impact, often leveraging data to support their perspectives and ensuring that we build not just functional solutions, but truly valuable ones.
High Autonomy
Trust is fundamental to our engineering culture, and we empower our engineers with significant autonomy. High autonomy at Equi means having the freedom to determine the best way to tackle complex problems and execute tasks within the scope of agreed-upon goals. Engineers who thrive here are self-starters, comfortable navigating ambiguity, proactively seeking information, and taking ownership of their work end-to-end. This freedom comes paired with accountability; our engineers own their decisions and outcomes, learning and adapting from both successes and setbacks in a psychologically safe environment.
Bias Toward Action
In the fast-paced world of fintech, speed and decisiveness matter. A bias toward action at Equi means valuing progress and learning through doing rather than getting stalled by over-analysis or the pursuit of unattainable perfection. Engineers with this trait are adept at making calculated decisions, even with incomplete information, understanding that many choices are reversible and that iteration leads to better results. They proactively identify and remove roadblocks, break down large problems into manageable steps, readily experiment, and use feedback to adjust course quickly, ensuring that we continuously deliver value to our customers. This proactive approach, enabled by autonomy and guided by a product mindset, is key to our innovation cycle.