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Founding Engineer (Firmware/Systems)

EQL Tech

San Francisco, CAFull-time$150–200K/yrPosted 4w agoVerified open 4 days ago
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At a glance

Compensation
$150–200K/yr
Location
San Francisco, CA
Schedule
Full-time
Work Authorization
Visa required • Visa sponsorship

Job overview

EQL Tech is hiring a Founding Engineer (Firmware/Systems). The client is a stealth, seed-stage startup developing an AI-powered wearable platform for industrial field technicians. This role focuses on the systems closest to the hardware, including the wearable device itself, backend, and edge layers. The position requires real firmware experience and involves working with real-time computer-vision and agentic AI systems on smart-glasses hardware.

Key focus areas include Flash, patch, and adapt vendor firmware, Work in embedded Linux/RTOS or device SDKs, and Evaluate camera/sensor hardware and define specs.

Successful candidates bring 1-4 Years Software Engineering Experience, Founding-Engineer/Early-Startup Experience, and Intense-Culture Company Experience. Important skills include Firmware Experience, Embedded Linux, Real-Time Operating Systems, Device SDKs, Hardware Spec-Writing, and C.

Skills & qualifications

RequiredNice to have

Skills

Firmware ExperienceEmbedded LinuxReal-Time Operating SystemsDevice SDKsHardware Spec-WritingCC++RustReal-Time Multimodal Pipeline OwnershipAWSGCPSupabaseRailwayEdge/on-Device InferenceOn-Prem/Air-Gapped DeploymentHardware-to-Software Integration

Qualifications

1-4 Years Software Engineering ExperienceFounding-Engineer/Early-Startup ExperienceIntense-Culture Company Experience

Full job description

Founding Engineer (Firmware/Systems) On-site · Engineering, Product & Tech · Full time San Francisco, California, United States

Description Our client is a stealth, seed-stage startup building an AI-powered wearable platform for industrial field technicians - running a real-time computer-vision and agentic AI system directly on smart-glasses hardware, live today with major data-center, energy, and industrial customers across multiple countries. Backed by a $5M seed round and founded by researchers from Harvard/NASA (computer vision, published at NeurIPS and ICCV) and MIT (machine learning, ex-quant researcher).

The bet: computer vision and agentic vision-language models (VLMs) grounded in real integrations with legacy enterprise systems (ServiceNow, SAP, Salesforce) - not another LLM wrapper. The industrial data this generates is also laying the groundwork for robotics automation down the line.

This is the systems seat closest to the hardware: real work on the wearable device itself, plus the backend and edge layers around it. Firmware experience is a genuine requirement here.

What you'll do

  • Flash, patch, and adapt vendor firmware; work in embedded Linux/RTOS or device SDKs
  • Evaluate camera/sensor hardware and define specs (FOV, battery, thermal, compute, latency) alongside the hardware ODM partner
  • Build backend systems on a modern startup stack, comfortable close to the metal (C/C++/Rust)
  • Own a real-time multimodal pipeline end-to-end: capture/encoding, low-latency transport, low-latency model serving Location & culture Fully on-site in the SF Bay Area. The founding team lives and works together for the first several months in a shared house before moving to a standard office — expect an intense, in-person, high-ownership culture. Hours flex for exceptional, senior talent; the priority is getting the right person, not saving on salary.

Requirements

Essential

  • 1–4 years software engineering (more if exceptional); founding-engineer/early-startup experience, or from an intense-culture company (e.g. Tesla, SpaceX, Anduril, top YC)

  • Real firmware/embedded experience: vendor firmware work, embedded Linux/RTOS or device SDKs, hardware spec-writing

  • Back-end-leaning full-stack on a modern stack (AWS, GCP, Supabase, Railway), comfortable in C/C++/Rust

  • Owns a real-time multimodal pipeline end-to-end Particularly valuable

  • Edge/on-device inference

  • On-prem/air-gapped deployment experience (aerospace, defense, critical infrastructure)

  • Hardware-to-software integration across wearables, cameras, robotics, IoT, or drones Benefits

Compensation & benefits

  • Base: $150K–$200K
  • Equity: 2%–3% (flexed higher for exceptional candidates)
  • Visa sponsorship available (O-1, TN, E-3, H-1B1, H-1B transfer, F-1 OPT/STEM OPT)

How to apply: resume plus a short description of a firmware/embedded system you've shipped.

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