Founding Engineer

Hi, We are Asendia AI!

The global staffing industry is $600B+ and still runs on manual phone calls and gut feelings. We built an AI agent that screens, interviews, and scores candidates 24/7, live, in real time, at a fraction of the cost. Already running thousands of AI-powered screens for staffing agencies across the US and Europe. Clients place candidates within days of going live. We cut screening costs by 90%.

YC P25. Seed-stage. Years of runway. AI penetration in staffing is under 1%.

The Opportunity

US staffing agencies spend $20B+ annually on manual screening alone. Globally, it's multiples of that. There's no dominant AI platform yet, no "Salesforce of AI recruitment." The closest comps: Bullhorn ($4B+ valuation), HireVue ($100M+ revenue), Veritone (acquired $170M), all legacy platforms bolting on AI. We're AI-native from day one.

Asendia has a realistic path to becoming a $1B+ platform. Early equity here is how careers get transformed.

What You'll Own

You're not filling a role. You're building the product.

• Real-time voice systems: AI phone interviews with sub-300ms latency using FastAPI, WebSockets, and LLM orchestration.
• Candidate scoring pipelines: Turning messy voice conversations into structured, reliable scores.
• ATS integrations: Two-way syncs with Applicant Tracking Systems that enterprise clients depend on.
• Recruiter dashboards: React/Next.js interfaces where staffing teams manage workflows, analytics, and reports.
• Agentic infrastructure: A framework where every client customizes their own AI screening workflows and voice personalities.
• Cloud & scale: Azure (Functions, AKS, Cosmos DB), CI/CD, monitoring. Taking us from hundreds to tens of thousands of concurrent sessions.

Who We're Looking For

• You've shipped products end-to-end, solo or as the primary builder. Side projects, startups, open source, show us what you've built.
• You're strong across the stack: Python backend, React frontend, cloud infrastructure. You don't wait for anyone to finish a feature.
• You have product instinct. You talk to users, understand why something matters, and build accordingly.
• You're high-agency. When there's no documentation, no playbook, and a client deadline on Friday, you figure it out.
• You want ownership and equity, not just a paycheck. This is a founding role, not a senior eng seat.

Bonus: Experience with voice/speech systems, NLP, LLMs, or real-time streaming architectures.

Not required: A specific number of years. We care about what you've built, not how long you've been building

Why This, Why Now

A $600B industry is being rebuilt by AI, right now, not in five years. We're at the exact inflection point where the technology works, the market is ready, and the incumbents are too slow. You'd be joining a YC-backed company with real customers, real revenue, years of runway, and a founding team that's been building together for nearly a decade.

There's no layer between you and impact. No politics, no waiting for roadmap approval, no "we'll revisit next quarter." You ship it, customers use it, and you see the result.

Come build the future of how people get hired.

• Founder Chat. A direct conversation with the founders about vision, traction, and what you've built.
• Paid Technical Project. A real problem from our stack. We pay you for your time.
• Technical Deep Dive. Walk through your project, extend the problem, and build together.
• References & Offer. We'll ask for references, then move fast to close with full transparency on comp and equity.