Senior Forward Deployed Engineer

• Backed by leading investors, including Bessemer Venture Partners, Salesforce Ventures, Amplo, Boeing, and RTX Ventures, Axion is poised to lead the quality revolution in manufacturing
• We’re building our first Forward Deployed Engineering team to turn those opportunities into software customers use
• You’ll be one of the first two engineers shaping the function, with the responsibility to understand a customer’s problem, decide what is worth building, and take the solution from an initial idea to a reliable deployment
• This is a hands-on software engineering role. You will write and review code, work through messy data, design integrations and applications, and own how your software behaves after release
• You’ll also spend time with customers: asking questions, observing workflows, explaining tradeoffs, and testing whether what you’ve built actually solves the problem
• You’ll report to our Head of Strategic Accounts and work alongside our account-facing Solutions Directors, and have a dotted-line relationship with Engineering
• You’ll combine direct customer engagement with substantial hands-on build time. The role is based in New York or San Francisco with 25-50% travel
• Understand and scope. Work directly with customer business and technical teams to identify a valuable use case. Turn broad requests into a focused scope, clear acceptance criteria, and a practical delivery plan. Know when existing Axion capabilities are sufficient, when new software is needed, and when a request should be narrowed or declined
• Build and deploy. Design and implement the data integrations, business logic, APIs, applications, and AI-enabled workflows needed for the solution
• Deliver usable software iteratively, with tests, clear interfaces, appropriate access controls, and a deployment approach agreed with Engineering. Use AI where it helps; use deterministic software where correctness and repeatability call for it
• Validate and own. Reconcile outputs against source data and agreed business rules. Evaluate model behavior when AI is part of the solution
• Work with users to validate accuracy, usability, and business value. Monitor deployments, resolve issues, document how the system works, and establish a clear ongoing support model
• Help the work scale. Partner with account teams to connect technical delivery to customer adoption and new use cases
• Work with Product and Engineering to identify patterns worth reusing, rather than creating a separate product for every customer. Help establish the engineering practices, delivery standards, and working relationships for the FDE team
• What Success Looks Like:
• Customers are using new workflows that would not otherwise have been delivered, can explain the value those workflows create, and have a clear reason to expand their use of Axion
• Your software is dependable, your scope decisions are thoughtful, and the work leaves the next deployment easier—not harder—to deliver
• We move fast, work smart, and hold ourselves to a high bar. Axion is a place for people who take pride in their craft and are motivated by meaningful work
• We respect time off and boundaries, but we’re also realistic: hard problems sometimes require weekend pushes or late-night thinking sessions. We support that balance — intensity with respect for recharge
• We stay highly collaborative and connected throughout the day — much of our communication happens over Slack. We move quickly, share feedback often, and keep discussions open so decisions and context flow freely
• If you value crisp communication, rapid iteration, and a steady hum of collaboration, you’ll fit right in

Benefits

• Employee stock option program
• Health Savings Account (HSA)
• Unlimited paid time off (PTO)
• Relocation support
• Commuter benefits
• Comprehensive healthcare coverage (100% of employee premiums covered and 70% for dependents)
• 12 weeks of paid parental leave (birthing parents)
• Daily lunch credit when you’re in the office (around $20/day)
• 401(k) plan with optional supplemental life, disability, and more

• Two paths into the role. You may have already worked as an FDE or customer-facing software engineer, with real ownership from discovery through deployment
• You may also be a strong software engineer ready for more customer exposure. For that second path, meaningful manufacturing or industrial workflow experience is particularly important
• We care more about what you’ve built and owned than whether you’ve held the FDE title
• Engineering. Strong software engineering fundamentals and a track record of personally shipping and maintaining production software. You can work independently across backend/application logic, data models, APIs, testing, and debugging
• You’re comfortable reasoning about reliability, permissions, failure cases, and the tradeoffs between a fast first release and a maintainable system
• Useful experience. Python and SQL; full-stack application development with TypeScript/React or comparable tools; enterprise data and API integrations; applied AI or agent workflows with rigorous evaluation; and manufacturing, quality, reliability, supply-chain, or service operations
• You do not need every item on this list. Strong engineering judgment and demonstrated delivery are more important than familiarity with a particular framework
• Customer ownership. You enjoy understanding how people work and translating an ambiguous problem into a useful solution
• You communicate clearly with technical and nontechnical colleagues, take responsibility for outcomes, and can push back constructively when a request is not the right thing to build. You’re comfortable operating in a small team without waiting for a fully specified backlog
• You’re a builder and operator who thrives in fast-moving, high-accountability environments. You take pride in getting things done — thoughtfully, efficiently, and without drama
• You value feedback — giving it, receiving it, and acting on it — and you see collaboration as a competitive advantage, not a burden
• You’re energized by ambiguity, skilled at bringing clarity, and comfortable flexing between strategy and execution
• You’re low-ego but high-agency: you care about winning as a team more than being right individually. You move quickly, communicate directly, and make decisions grounded in impact and data
• You don’t need constant direction — you create momentum. You take ownership for outcomes, and you expect the same from those around you