Overview

Sphere is a company solving complex global trade compliance using AI (TRAM) that interprets and resolves conflicts across 190+ jurisdictions. Sphere handles the entire compliance lifecycle at millisecond latency with zero downtime. The company is backed by a16z and YC, has $21M Series A funding, 30%+ month-over-month growth, and customers like ElevenLabs, Replit, Deel, Runway, and Lovable. The team is small and globally distributed with a San Francisco HQ requiring on-site presence five days a week. The problem space is expanding into input tax, withholding, e-invoicing, tariffs, increasing complexity with tens of millions of transactions today and billions ahead.

Job Description

Role: Founding Forward Deployed Engineer

Location: San Francisco HQ (On-site)
Employment Type: Full time
Department: Engineering

Role Summary

The Founding Forward Deployed Engineer will embed directly with Sphere's strategic customers to understand their cross-border workflows, identify compliance challenges, and design custom solutions integrating Sphere into their operations. This role involves defining the forward-deployed engineering approach while working closely with the Founder, Engineering, and GTM teams. It requires ownership of problems end-to-end from discovery to deployment and translating complex regulatory requirements into production-grade software. The role demands comfort in both customer interaction and technical codebase work.

Responsibilities

Enablement

Onboard customers pre-contract and get accounts functional in Sphere.
Navigate customer billing system integrations.
Interpret liability reports to help customers understand exposure.
Guide clients on managing global tax liability.
Assist customers with VAT ID collection, address hygiene, and regional compliance.

Monetization

Act as bridge between customer needs and engineering roadmap.
Ensure Sphere is integral to customer revenue compliance needs.
Research new compliance requirements (e-invoicing, input tax).
Identify recurring custom work patterns across customers.
Scope and write technical PRDs/proposals for core engineering.
Build custom features/integrations on Sphere platform for key accounts.
Identify scalable custom builds for deployment as new features/products.

Requirements

Experience in Forward Deployed Engineering or customer-facing engineering roles.
Proven ability to execute and ship bespoke customer features end-to-end.
Strong ownership mentality; able to take ambiguous problems through to shipped solutions independently.
Relentless curiosity; proactive in finding answers and knowing when to seek expertise.
Strong communication skills for fast-paced work environment.
Customer obsession; comfortable engaging finance professionals (Controllers, Heads of Finance/Tax).
Very strong attention to detail; accuracy critical when working with numbers.

Nice to Haves

Experience handling large volumes of transaction data.
Experience with Python and Django (Sphere’s backend stack).
Experience with React (Sphere’s frontend stack).

Candidate Profile

Ideal candidates are driven ("Dog" mentality), thrive in early-stage environments without playbooks or instructions, own problems end-to-end, believe in balancing speed with accuracy, and are motivated by ambiguity rather than deterred by it. Not suitable for those seeking structured environments or preferring management over hands-on problem solving or who accept "good enough" shipping given the high impact of errors.