Backend Engineer
About Kernel
We’re building the developer platform that lets AI agents use applications, starting with browsers. Our edge is an infrastructure platform that’s extensible, observable, and built for scale from day one. Our platform handles the hard stuff: spinning up browsers quickly and efficiently at scale, providing great observability into their activity, and enabling both humans and AI agents to interact with them. If you’re interested in building critical infrastructure for the next generation of AI applications, we’d love to chat.
About the role
As Founding Backend Engineer at Kernel, you’ll architect and build the core systems that power our AI agent platform end-to-end. You’ll own critical developer-focused products from conception to production, working with bleeding edge tech that needs to be both reliable and low latency. You’ll also play a foundational role in how we build Kernel’s culture.
What you’ll do
Design, develop, and scale new our product suite of developer tools, CLIs, and APIs
Set direction for critical technical surface areas, enabling us to stay ahead of rapid growth
Shape Kernel’s hiring decisions and culture as we grow
What we’re looking for
Experience building extensible APIs, SDKs, and databases designed for scale and high throughput
>=1 year of experience at a company with <50 people
Technical excellence: we’re building core infrastructure that’s default open source. As a developer tool, our technical decisions are the product, and the details matter a lot.
Low ego, high impact: you care more about building something meaningful than who gets credit
Start-up ready: early stage sometimes means figuring it out as we go, and that energizes rather than drains you
Excited to crush it: we’re moving fast and looking for people excited about high velocity, high impact work, and having fun along the way.
What you can expect as a Kernel
Industry-competitive salary
Above market equity
Premium medical + dental coverage + dependent coverage
Small, trusting team of senior + staff engineers
Default async with minimal bureaucracy, only one meeting a week
$1k / mo budget for LLM usage fees #vibecheck
Daily lunches on us
Unlimited PTO
401k + company match
Relocation assistance
Hiring process
We have a simple process focused on real world collaboration and jointly getting to know each other:
30 minute intro calls with each of Kernel’s co-founders (1 hour total)
Half-day on-site (virtual or in-person) working with our team and co-founders on relevant technical challenges.
Offer!
Average salary estimate
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