Tech Lead/Engineering Manager (EM)

Our client is a fast-growing audio data research company building high-quality datasets for frontier AI labs and leading technology companies. Founded in 2024 by former large-scale AI data engineers and operators, the company has grown to roughly 50 employees, serves most major AI labs and technology leaders, generates eight figures of revenue, and has raised $80M from top-tier investors.

We are hiring a hands-on Tech Lead and Engineering Manager to lead and grow a product-focused engineering team. Reporting directly to the CTO, you will shape technical direction, ship the core products behind an audio data research platform, and build a high-performing organization.

What you'll do

• Hire, structure, mentor, and grow the engineering team while maintaining high performance standards

• Remain hands-on technically and write code regularly, especially during the early months

• Scope and ship products that help researchers use high-quality audio data

• Build scalable processing pipelines that extract useful information from terabytes of audio data each day

• Architect systems for dramatically higher capacity across data collection, curation, and delivery

• Partner with the CTO to set technical direction and execute an ambitious product roadmap

• Lead zero-to-one product work and scale successful systems

• At least six years of product-focused engineering experience

• Strong web development fundamentals and experience shipping user-facing products end to end

• Experience leading technical teams through rapid growth at a high-growth startup or scale-up

• A track record of building zero-to-one products and scaling them successfully

• Comfort solving ambiguous, previously unsolved problems with clear customer impact

• A bias toward action paired with detailed, reliable execution

• Willingness to work five days per week from the San Francisco office

Bonus points

• At least two years of formal engineering management experience

• Experience as a founder or early technical leader

• Experience with large-scale data pipelines, audio systems, or AI infrastructure

• Familiarity with Next.js, TypeScript, Node.js, PostgreSQL, AWS, WebRTC, or FFmpeg

• Base salary of $250K-$300K

• Competitive equity

• Unlimited paid time off

• 100% health coverage

• Daily meals and fitness benefits

• Visa transfers, including OPT or H-1B transfers, are available

• On-site five days per week in San Francisco, California

• Full-time position