Founding Engineer - Applied AI -- Antes

Job Description

Job Description

Founding Engineer – Applied AI — Antes

Location: San Francisco, CA (Onsite preferred — exceptional remote candidates considered)
Compensation: $180,000 – $250,000 base + equity
Visa Sponsorship: H-1B, O-1, OPT supported
Experience Level: 2–6 years
Employment Type: Full-Time

About Antes

Antes is building AI hardware for complex manufacturers — at the intersection of AI, hardware development, and policy, accelerating innovation and safety in the physical world. Antes partners with some of the world's most iconic automotive, aerospace, and industrial manufacturers and is backed by General Catalyst, Kleiner Perkins, and the parent company of Ferrari.

The founding team brings expertise across AI, advanced engineering, and policy — including a former America's Cup world champion, a global legal compliance lead at Uber, AI researchers from Stanford AI Lab, the former president of Hyundai, a CTO of Caterpillar, a former Chairman of the FAA and FCC, and other senior leaders from industry and government.

About the Role

Antes is hiring a world-class Applied AI Engineer to build the core systems behind their automation engine for hardware engineering. You will design, implement, and post-train AI agents that power critical product development workflows for global enterprise customers — working on novel AI systems that retrieve, interpret, and manipulate complex engineering design data, integrating deeply into real-world engineering environments.

This is a deeply technical, high-impact role. You will be among the first technical hires and will own mission-critical systems end to end. The problems are ambiguous, the constraints are real, and the expectations are high.

What You'll Own

• Engineering agent workflows: Design and implement core workflows and infrastructure for hardware engineering agents, including intelligent context management, novel indexing approaches, and post-training
• Design data interpretation: Build agents and ML models that can interpret, reason over, and manipulate complex engineering design data, integrating with enterprise-grade engineering tools and systems
• Direct customer collaboration: Work closely with customers and the engineering team to deliver AI-powered workflows that are reliable, intuitive, and trusted in production environments
• Prototype rapidly, validate ideas with real users, and ship frequently
• Influence engineering culture, architecture decisions, and the future of the product

Requirements

• Bachelor's or higher in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or equivalent experience
• Strong familiarity with LLM architectures and agent research trends
• Excellent programming skills with experience using ML libraries such as PyTorch, Hugging Face, and W&B
• Experience building production ML or AI systems
• Solid practical experience with search and information retrieval
• Moves fast from idea to production with a genuine care for customer experience
• Based in or willing to relocate to San Francisco — or an exceptional remote candidate

Nice to Have

• 2+ years in applied machine learning, backend engineering, or AI infrastructure
• Experience working with machine learning over geometric data, including CAD
• Track record of high-impact contributions or published papers at top-tier AI labs or teams

Benefits

• Unlimited PTO
• Full health insurance
• Free lunch and dinner
• Company equipment provided

Interview Process

1. Pending approval
2. First round chat
3. Second round engineering test
4. Onsite (paid, all expenses covered)
5. Offer

Logistics

• SF onsite strongly preferred — exceptional remote candidates considered
• H-1B, O-1, and OPT visa sponsorship available

Shortlisted candidates will be contacted by David Joseph & Co. , the recruiting partner managing this search on behalf of Antes.