Founding Forward Deployed Engineer at Dryft (San Francisco, CA)Founding Forward Deployed Engineer

Dryft builds intelligent systems that automate complex human decisions in manufacturing operations

We’re a small, talent-dense team with modest roots and a love for the physical world - cars, machines, planes. Our team includes graduates from Stanford, Berkeley, CDTM, TUM, winners of Stanford TreeHacks, recipients of Fulbright & Haniel scholarships, and builders of everything from robots and race cars to software with millions of downloads.

We’re backed by the founders and leaders behind Amazon, Facebook, Stripe, Applied Intuition, & others; General Catalyst & Neo, and board members of global industrial companies.

Today, we’re already saving customers millions. But this is only the beginning. ERPs ran the physical world for half a century. Dryft is powering the next.

This role is our most entrepreneurial. I no other role will you learn more about how to become a great founder, listener & builder.

As our Founding Forward Deployed Engineer, you’ll operate at the intersection of product, engineering, and operations. 50% Engineering, 50% Customer interaction.

• Design the product backbone. Work hands-on with users, translate their pain into product improvements, and prototype features yourself - ideally writing production code when needed.
• Turn operations into product. Every deployment becomes a blueprint for scale — you’ll transform learnings into reusable product features, data models, and playbooks that move Dryft from bespoke to productized.
• Lead full-stack rollouts. Own implementations end-to-end: from scoping and onboarding to integration and training. Align IT teams, engineers, and C-level execs across Germany, the EU, and the US (10–30% travel).
• Shape how Dryft scales. Work directly with the CEO & CTO to define the product DNA, build the foundation for future teams, and grow into roles like CPO or COO.

This is a high-ownership, zero-handholding role for someone who loves turning complexity into clarity and shipping solutions that just work.

YOU

• Product architect at heart. You turn ERP frustrations into intuitive features. You care deeply about UX, speed, and simplicity.
• Sharp mind: You pick up new concepts extremely quickly. You listen. You remember the details - even of things you never heard about.
• Systems thinker. You design processes that scale - in code, in operations, and in how people work. You think in data and automation.
• Quality-obsessed. You hold yourself to a high bar, dive deep into problems, and care about getting it right - not just getting it done.
• Confident communicator. You can calm an impatient exec, convince a skeptical IT leader, and still keep humor in the room.
• Down-to-earth & relatable. You bond with shop-floor operators as easily as with boardroom execs.
• Fluent German & English speaker. Our customers are global, and you’ll move between San Francisco, the US Midwest, Mexico and the heart of German manufacturing.

• FE (TypeScript): React, Chakra UI v3, TanStack Router, TanStack Query, Vite
• BE (Python): FastAPI with Pydantic v2, SQLModel, Postgres with pgvector, dagster
• AI: Pydantic AI, Langfuse