Founding Engineer (Protocols & Commerce)

Location: Seattle metro area (hybrid; minimum three on‑site days per week)

Compensation: Equity with no cash salary until first institutional funding round. Upon funding, base salary of $200,000 USD plus benefits and option refreshes.

ABOUT US

Agents are the new storefronts; discovery now happens at the edge—inside assistants, not inside apps.

As discovery leaves their walled gardens, platforms are moving to protect ad revenue and checkout fees by gating agents, tightening APIs, and forcing “human review.”

Synvya is the open alternative: a direct, merchant-owned agent channel with verified identity and low-friction payments. If you believe agents need open rails for commerce, come and join us build the open, agent-native commerce rails: identity, discovery, and payments — with no middleman.

WHY THIS ROLE MATTERS

As the co-founding engineer, you will own every line of code and every technical decision until we can hire behind you. If that sounds thrilling rather than terrifying, keep reading.

WHAT YOU'LL DO (DAY 1 → DAY 1000)

• Design, implement, and ship cross-stack features spanning FastAPI (backend), Python SDK, React (merchant portal), and our MCP-based discovery/index.
• Integrate with third-party systems (Square APIs, one Lightning stack) and wire secure webhooks.
• Model core domain entities: merchant, stall, product, basket, order, payment, refund.
• Own data migrations, observability, and production readiness (Docker, ECS, Postgres).
• Write pragmatic tests (unit, integration, E2E) and crisp developer docs.
• Set engineering standards for code quality, reviews, and release cadence.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

Non‑Negotiables

• 8+ years building production web backends (Python/FastAPI or Node/TypeScript) with relational DBs (Postgres/MySQL) and migrations (Alembic/Prisma/Flyway).
• Proven experience shipping payments or marketplace workflows (checkout, webhooks, refunds) with providers like Square/Stripe/Adyen.
• Comfortable with auth/signing schemes (HMAC/JWT); can implement a spec (we use Nostr Implementation Proposals 98 for signed HTTP and 99 for listings).
• Strong API design, data modeling, and event-driven thinking.
• DevOps fluency: Docker, CI, cloud deploys (AWS/GCP/Azure), metrics/logging.
• Product mindset—you can cut scope smartly and still deliver a lovable demo.

Nice‑to‑Haves

• Experience with Nostr or other decentralized protocols.
• Lightning/BTC integrations (BTCPay, LNbits, LND).
• React/Vite or Next.js; TypeScript on the front end.
• Agent frameworks (MCP, JSON-RPC, SSE), retrieval/caching, or multi-relay networking.

WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE (FIRST 12 MONTHS)

1. MVP scaled to serve 10× the current user load with 99.9% uptime.

2. Engineering organization built: first 3‑5 key hires onboarded and shipping.

3. Technical roadmap and budget presented to — and approved by — investors.

4. Security baseline (SOC2 type I) completed and audit scheduled.

5. Company culture of rapid, responsible delivery established.

We are an equal‑opportunity employer. We value velocity, candor, and genuine curiosity over pedigree.