VP of Engineering

About 1Kosmos

1Kosmos is the leader in identity verification, providing a unified platform that combines identity verification and passwordless authentication into a single distributed identity cloud service. With 75M+ users, billions of verifications and authentications, and 3x growth, we're transforming how organizations verify and authenticate workers, customers, and citizens. We're FedRAMP High Authorized—the only FedRAMP High authorized, Kantara-certified Full Service NIST 800-63-3 digital identity wallet solution—and certified to the highest industry standards including FIDO2, ISO 27001, and SOC II Type 2. Recognized by Gartner as ranking highest for Workforce Use Cases in the 2025 Critical Capabilities for Identity Verification report, 1Kosmos is trusted by Fortune 500 enterprises across financial services, government, healthcare, insurance, manufacturing, and retail. As a Series B company experiencing rapid growth, we're now building critical fraud detection capabilities to protect our customers and their users from evolving identity threats.

The Opportunity

At 1Kosmos, our leaders are active, builder-first contributors. We are looking for an engineering leader who stays close to the code—someone who enjoys diving into technical challenges, understanding system internals, and driving execution from the front lines through active participation in architectural design, code reviews, and hands-on problem-solving.

You possess an "always sleeveless" mindset: no task is too technical, no bug is too small, and no architecture is too complex for you to dive into. You will step into a cloud-agnostic microservices environment, gain deep context on what we’ve built, and actively drive execution, performance, security, and system evolution.

What You’ll Do:

- Lead from the Front: Manage, mentor, and elevate a mid-sized engineering team while remaining deeply technical and hands-on in code, system design, and infrastructure.

- Master Existing Architecture First: Take full ownership of existing architectures. Deeply understand the whybehind our current design decisions before making tactical shifts or introducing new paradigms.

- Build Real Agentic Systems: Work hands-on with our agentic stack (AWS Bedrock / Python / Node), going far beyond basic LLM prompts or chatbots. Open the hood to optimize agent workflows, orchestration, reliability, and security.

- Drive Performance & Security: Maintain a relentless focus on low latency, high throughput, platform resilience, and enterprise security across our cloud-agnostic microservices topology.

- Own Delivery & Reliability: Partner with product and QA leads to ensure clean, reliable, and zero-downtime deployments.

- Foster a Zero-Ego Culture: Build a collaborative environment where ownership is non-negotiable, and execution speaks louder than slides.

What We’re Looking For

- 10+ years of software engineering experience with recent, hands-on engineering leadership (Director / VP level in high-growth B2B SaaS).

- Core Microservices Stack: Deep, practical experience in Node.js (90% of our stack) alongside Java or GoLang.

- Cloud & Infrastructure: Hands-on mastery of containerized, cloud-agnostic environments (Kubernetes, AWS).

- Applied Agentic Experience: Demonstrated experience building and operationalizing autonomous agents and agentic workflows (experience with AWS Bedrock is a huge plus).

- Security-First Mindset: Deep appreciation for platform security, identity management, compliance, and secure software development practices.

- Leadership Style: Proven track record of both building 0-to-1 systems and taking ownership of mature, inherited codebases.

Who Thrives Here:

• Builders who love creating something from nothing and aren't afraid of rolling up their sleeves

• Fast movers who navigate ambiguity with confidence and iterate at speed

• Problem solvers who are energized by complex, evolving challenges

• Collaborators who can influence without authority and build strong cross-functional relationships

• Data enthusiasts who let evidence drive decisions, not opinions

• Mission-driven professionals passionate about fighting fraud and protecting customers

What We Offer:

• Opportunity to build and lead a critical function at a high-growth Series B startup

• Competitive salary and equity package

• Health, dental, and vision insurance

• Unlimited PTO Policy

• Collaborative, fast-paced culture where your impact is immediate and visible