Founding Engineer

2 hours ago

San Francisco, California, United States Terac Full time

Location:
San Francisco, CA (in-person preferred)

Team:
Engineering (reporting to CTO Jack Blair)

Stage:
Seed ($9M raised from Emergence, SignalFire, Audacious, ZFellows)

About Terac
We're building a
search engine for human thought
.

While you might go to Google to search through the web, you come to
Terac
to search through
human opinion
. Consumer research teams at DoorDash, Notion, and Posh use Terac to test features and products before launch. Our AI-native researcher recruits the right panelists, conducts real voice interviews, and delivers transcripts and insights within hours—not weeks.

We're solving a once-in-a-generation problem at the frontier of
Voice AI, memory systems, and large-scale data matching
. As the world races to automate engineering, the real bottleneck is understanding what to build and who to build for. Terac exists to fix that.

We started 5 months ago and have already raised $9M, built an in-house AI panel of thousands, and launched pilots with major consumer companies. Joining now means being part of the
founding team
defining the next $100B market.

*The Role
We're looking for a
founding engineer*
who wants to own huge pieces of the product, move fast, and help build the future of human understanding.

You'll work directly with our CTO to design, build, and scale the core systems behind Terac, from our sourcing algorithms and interviewer agents to our panel data pipelines and researcher tools.

This is not a "feature factory" role. You'll ship end-to-end systems, debug live customer interactions, and shape the company's engineering DNA from day one.

*What You'll Do*

  • Own and scale major parts of Terac's core platform (e.g. sourcing algorithm, interviewer agent, data analysis pipelines).
  • Architect and implement fullstack features using , TypeScript, tRPC, Prisma, and Supabase.
  • Collaborate with the founders to shape product direction and prioritize the roadmap.
  • Fix bugs, build fast, and move from "0 → 1 → scale" repeatedly.
  • Recruit and mentor future engineers as the team grows.
  • Use and improve Terac every day. We're power users of our own product.

*About You*
You're the kind of engineer who might have once tried to start a company yourself, or still might someday. You're relentless, hands-on, and care deeply about building something meaningful.

Must-haves

  • 3+ years of experience building fullstack products end-to-end.
  • Deep fluency with TypeScript, , and modern backend tools (tRPC, Prisma, Postgres).
  • Experience with LLMs, RAG architectures, and AI SDKs (Vercel AI SDK, Gemini, etc.).
  • Proven ability to take full ownership of projects or small teams.
  • Strong technical independence; you can design, ship, and iterate.

Nice-to-haves

  • Experience as a founding engineer or early-stage builder.
  • Infra wizardry (AWS, CI/CD, scalable data systems).
  • Familiarity with Terac's stack: Vercel, , Infisical, AWS, Supabase.
  • Previous startup or high-ownership environments.

Why Terac

  • High level engineering challenge: We're building the infrastructure for matching questions to the best human answers at a global scale.
  • Real impact, real users: Hundreds of people interact with our systems every day.
  • Speed & autonomy: Small team, high trust, no bureaucracy.
  • Meaningful equity: Join early and help shape the company's DNA.

The Stack

  • Frontend: (React), TypeScript, Tailwind, Shadcn, Framer Motion
  • Backend: tRPC, Prisma ORM, Supabase Postgres
  • Infra: Vercel, , Infisical, GitHub Actions, AWS
  • AI: Vercel AI SDK, Gemini Live API, Gemini 2.5 Pro

Terac — Build the search engine for human thought.

  • Founding Engineer

    1 hour ago

    San Francisco, California, United States 1821 Talent Group Full time

    The Role: Founding Engineer (Stealth & Pre-Seed)1821 Talent Group is a direct placement firm representing a curated portfolio of high-growth technology startups in the Bay Area. We specialize in connecting "Ex-FAANG" caliber engineering talent with Seed and Series A companies building their core product teams.We are currently pipelining Senior and Staff...

  • Founding Engineer

    54 minutes ago

    San Francisco, California, United States Ladybug Memory Full time

    Company DescriptionLadybugDB is an open source embedded graph database with an emphasis on object storage. The project is supported by Ladybug Memory, Inc.Role DescriptionThis is a full-time on-site role for a Founding Engineer, located in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Founding Engineer will be responsible for developing and implementing technical...

  • Founding Engineer

    10 minutes ago

    San Francisco, California, United States scalr Full time

    Founding Engineer (AI Backend / Platform)Early-stage AI startup, YC-backed, high ownershipMy client is building infrastructure that allows companies to fine-tune and deploy large language models into reliable, production-grade systems.This is a true founding engineer role at the intersection of backend engineering, distributed systems, and ML infrastructure....

  • Founding Engineer

    28 minutes ago

    San Francisco, California, United States Career Renew Full time

    Career Renew is recruiting for one of its clients a  Founding Engineer - Crypto - this is a fully-remote role for US-based candidates (or onsite if based in NY). Salary range: K USD plus benefits.We are building an accountability protocol.We are hiring an exceptional Founding Full-stack Engineer to accelerate our buildout of a consumer-facing native iOS...

  • Founding Engineer

    2 hours ago

    San Francisco, California, United States Terac Full time

    Founding EngineerLocation: San Francisco, CA (in-person preferred) Team: Engineering (reporting to CTO Jack Blair) Stage: Seed ($9M raised from Emergence, SignalFire, Audacious, ZFellows)About TeracWe're building a search engine for human thought.While you might go to Google to search through the web, you come to Terac to search through human opinion....

  • Founding Engineer

    3 hours ago

    San Francisco, California, United States AnswerThis (YC F25) Full time

    Who We AreAnswerThis is accelerating the path to scientific discoveries by automating the most tedious part of research: literature reviews. Over 300,000 scientists across top universities and companies have used AnswerThis to accelerate their research.We are backed by Y Combinator, Phosphor Capital, as well as leaders at companies like OpenAI, Google,...

  • Founding Engineer

    52 minutes ago

    San Francisco, California, United States NOSO LABS(YC S25) Full time

    We work 6 days a week and we ping each other every night, if you are applying please make sure you are okay with the culture.\ \ As Founding Software Engineer, you will be our first full-time engineer and play a pivotal role in shaping our product and technology stack from the ground up. You will work closely with the founding team to design and build...

  • Founding Engineer

    5 minutes ago

    San Francisco, California, United States Midpoint Full time

    At Midpoint, our mission is to let everybody build custom automation for their needs. Companies run a ton of business software that isn't connected to each other, and much of the data flow is still stitched together by people. Today, it costs $50 to $150 an hour to hire an engineer to build out a bespoke automation that fits your needs as a company. We...

  • Founding Engineer

    1 hour ago

    San Francisco, California, United States Lance (YC W26) Full time

    Company DescriptionLance is an innovative AI voice agent designed specifically for hotel operations. It provides human-like responses to guest inquiries and efficiently routes communication to address needs promptly. Lance also manages complex processes across the hospitality technology ecosystem, streamlining operations and enhancing the guest experience....

  • Founding Engineer

    3 hours ago

    San Francisco, California, United States Muro AI Full time $120,000 - $200,000

    About Muro AIMuro AI is transforming how the $2T construction industry plans and builds. Founded by Cornell alumni, ex-founders, and former McKinsey operators, we're building AI agents that automate the most complex, manual, and costly phase of construction: preconstruction.We move fast, build with conviction, and obsess over delivering real impact to the...