Technical Lead/CTO (+ Equity) at Fortalis

Technical Lead / CTO

As the founding technical hire, you will architect and build a modular software platform designed for high-consequence environments. You'll integrate disparate data sources and SME technologies into a unified operational picture for national resilience. This is a hands-on leadership role combining product strategy with first-principles engineering from a blank slate.

Location: London, UK

Why this role is remarkable:

• Founding ownership: As the first technical hire, you own the entire architectural roadmap and technology stack from day one without legacy constraints
• Mission-critical impact: Build the software layer for national resilience, solving fragmented data challenges for defenders in cyber, physical, and information domains
• High-upside equity: This role offers meaningful co-founder level equity or early-employee stakes for a mission-driven leader shaping a foundational security platform

What you will do:

• Architect and build an interoperable platform that ingests and synthesises cross-domain signals from multiple external data sources and SME technologies
• Collaborate directly with the CEO to translate complex real-world security problems into robust, scalable, and deployable software solutions
• Lead the development of distributed systems and integration-heavy APIs to produce decision-ready intelligence for government and critical infrastructure clients

The ideal candidate:

• 5–10 years of experience building and designing complex, integration-heavy distributed systems while remaining a hands-on, high-output individual contributor
• Strong architectural judgment with the ability to leverage AI tools and modern workflows to own the output of a foundational platform
• A mission-driven mindset with the desire to work in the defence and national security sector; prior experience in secure environments is a plus