Technical Co-Founder

About the Role

A Berlin-based pre-seed AI SaaS startup is looking for a Technical Co-Founder to join as the third member of the founding team. The company is building an AI-powered platform that automates the end-to-end lifecycle of public procurement participation - from tender discovery and requirements analysis through to compliant concept and proposal generation - targeting the DACH region. This role carries full technical ownership and a direct impact on product direction, architecture, and go-to-market traction.

The platform is built on LLMs, Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), and NLP, and must be fully GDPR-compliant, hosted in EU cloud environments. Incorporation is in preparation and a public funding application is currently in progress.
What You'll Do

• Design and own the overall system architecture, with a focus on GDPR-compliant EU cloud infrastructure (e.g., AWS Bedrock, Vertex AI - Frankfurt region).
• Build the core AI engine that generates complete, compelling proposal concepts from structured company data.
• Develop and maintain a reference database for past projects, certificates, and CVs, and integrate them dynamically into generated concepts.
• Implement entity resolution, reliability scoring, and confidence quantification across data pipelines.
• Work deeply in AI/ML (LLMs, RAG, NLP) and/or broadly across full-stack product engineering - depending on your strengths.
• Set technical priorities collaboratively within a small founding team.
• Contribute to business strategy during the pre-seed phase alongside the other co-founders.

What We're Looking For

Must-haves (dealbreakers):

• 5+ years of experience in product/engineering roles delivering AI-powered software with LLM, NLP, and/or RAG capabilities.
• Hands-on experience with GDPR-compliant architecture in EU cloud environments (data handling for NLP/LLM workloads).
• Prior experience as a technical founder or technical lead who has built an AI-first product from zero with end-to-end ownership.

Required:

• Strong, production-grade full-stack development skills for AI-enabled products.
• Practical experience integrating LLMs, RAG pipelines, and NLP into real products.
• Genuine founder mentality - you want to help build a company, not just work through tickets.
• Willingness to join as a technical co-founder with equity as the primary compensation during the pre-seed phase.
• German language proficiency (the product operates in the DACH regulatory context: VgV, HOAI, etc.).

Strongly preferred:

• Experience with enterprise data pipelines and secure data handling in EU cloud environments (DSGVO/GDPR context).
• Familiarity with German public procurement law or the architectural/planning office domain.
• Pragmatic, ship-first working style - you iterate quickly and avoid over-engineering.

Compensation & Equity

• Equity: 15-20% co-founder equity stake.
• Vesting: Standard four-year vesting schedule with a one-year cliff.
• Salary: Compensation is heavily equity-weighted during the pre-seed phase; cash salary to be discussed based on funding progress.
• Visa sponsorship: Not available.

Location

• Preferred: Berlin-based (on-site / hybrid).
• Remote within the DACH region (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) may be considered for the right candidate.