Founding Engineer

WHY THIS ROLE

• High autonomy & ownership: Own features end-to-end — from design and architecture through implementation, testing and deployment — with real say over product direction.


• Broad technical exposure: Work across the full stack — Next.js 15 + React 19 + Tailwind on the frontend; Node.js/TypeScript/Drizzle ORM and Python 3.11+/FastAPI on the backend; vector databases and RAG pipelines for AI search; plus DevOps for deployment and CI/CD.


• Collaborative environment: Join a small, high-trust, onsite team where your work is visible and valued, working directly with the Head of Engineering and other engineers.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Design and implement features for new modules — legal research casebase search, agentic workflows, practice management tools and Word integrations.


• Develop and maintain data ingestion and retrieval pipelines: embedding legal documents into vector databases (Pinecone/Qdrant/Milvus) and integrating LLMs for natural-language search.


• Coordinate with other engineers to ensure smooth integration across the stack, maintain code quality, and deliver on schedule and within budget.


• Contribute to DevOps — maintain Dockerized environments, CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions) and deployments to Railway or similar PaaS.


• Write clean, well-documented, reliable code with appropriate testing and performance optimisation.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

• 7–10 years of professional software engineering experience, ideally in high-autonomy or startup environments.


• Strong proficiency in JavaScript/TypeScript, React/Next.js, Node.js and Python (FastAPI/Pydantic).


• Experience with database technologies (PostgreSQL, MySQL) and ORMs (Drizzle ORM or similar).


• Familiarity with vector databases, graph databases and retrieval-augmented generation pipelines; ability to integrate LLMs (OpenAI, Anthropic) into products.


• Competence with DevOps tools: Docker, Docker Compose, GitHub Actions and cloud deployment (Railway or similar).


• Ability to use AI effectively in the product development process without creating tech debt.

BONUS SKILLS (NICE-TO-HAVE)

• Experience building legal knowledge systems or search engines.


• Familiarity with LangChain, LlamaIndex or other open-source RAG frameworks.


• Knowledge of Elasticsearch, Weaviate or other advanced retrieval systems.


• Experience with prompt engineering, model orchestration or performance tuning.


• Previous work on legal tech, fintech or enterprise SaaS products.

WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR

• Ownership & accountability: You take initiative, manage your own projects and deliver quality work without constant supervision.


• Collaboration & communication: You work well with others, articulate ideas clearly and stay open to feedback and iteration.


• Quality & reliability: You prioritise maintainable code and care about testing and user experience.


• Curiosity & growth mindset: You’re excited to learn new technologies (vector search, LLMs) and contribute to a fast-evolving legal AI platform.

BENEFITS

• High-impact work: Your contributions directly influence the direction of the platform and the legal industry.


• Competitive compensation: Scales with experience; includes paid holidays and flexible working arrangements.


• Learning & growth: Hands-on experience with RAG pipelines, vector databases, AI models and large-scale data ingestion — growing alongside a scaling team.