Senior Backend Engineer — AI-Orchestrated Build

netStripes is building an innovative Business Growth System for Australian SMEs. We need someone exceptional to architect and ship the first product layer.

Who we are

netStripes are in our 13th year and is an authority for digital and marketing serving Australian SME’s. We have worked with thousands of businesses and have developed great insights that we want to successfully drive further powered by our AI platforms.

We've spent over a decade refining a growth framework across these SMEs. One client — a specialty finance business — used it to compress their cost-per-lead from $161 to $2.69 over 28 months while growing lead volume 66× on flat ad spend. They were acquired subsequently highlighting a working system that needs to be amplified.

We're now turning that framework into a product.— an AI-native platform that runs growth for Australian SMEs the way Xero runs their accounting.

The first product layer ships by Q3 2026. We need a Senior AI-Orchestrating Engineer to lead the build.

What you'll build

You'll architect and ship the Opportunity Engine — the foundation product of GrowthXX. Every enquiry across web forms, phone calls, SMS, and DMs flows through it. AI engagement responds in under 60 seconds, qualifies the lead, and triggers automated follow-up. Owners see only opportunities ready for a sales call.

Underneath that visible product, you'll design the canonical data model that becomes the strategic foundation of every product layer that follows — the schema that turns every client's marketing and revenue data into one comparable language. The schema is where the moat lives. The architecture is yours to own.

You'll do this primarily through AI-orchestrated engineering. The how matters as much as the what — the operating manual you write for the AI (CLAUDE.md, AGENTS.md, or equivalent), the testing scaffolding you set up, the code review discipline you enforce, the judgment you apply when AI-generated code drifts from the architecture. Choose Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, or whatever tool your existing fluency points to. We have a view; you'll form your own in week one.

By Q3 2026, five paying clients will be using what you've built. By Q4, what you've built will be the foundation the next product layer is constructed on top of. This is a founding engineering role.

The first 14 days

Your first fortnight is Sprint 0 — architecture, schema, and sprint planning, not feature code. You'll write the architecture document. You'll freeze the canonical schema v1. You'll choose and document the AI orchestration approach. You'll walk Sash (Head of Operations), Pramuk (Performance Marketing), and Ishara (Software Engineer) through the design and capture their pushback.

On Day 14 we run a Sprint 0 demo. If the architecture and schema aren't ready, or the AI orchestration approach isn't documented, we don't start Sprint 1. Better to lose a fortnight at the start than four months at the end. We'll back you to hold that line.

Who you are

You've shipped at least one production B2B SaaS product end-to-end, where you owned the architecture. Not a feature inside a larger product. The whole product, or a substantial slice of it.

You have used Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, or equivalent AI-orchestration tools to ship production code that paying customers depend on. You can describe the testing and code review discipline you put around AI-generated code — and what went wrong when you didn't. Specific failure stories beat success stories. We trust engineers who've seen the failure modes.

You can write a clean architecture document before writing any code, and you defend that document when AI-generated code wants to drift from it.

You write Python and TypeScript fluently. You have integrated with at least three of: Google Ads API, Meta Marketing API, GA4, Xero or MYOB, HubSpot or Salesforce, or equivalent. Bonus if you've done it with reliable rate-limit handling — because that's where most integrations quietly fail.

You can work effectively when the founder has 25 hours a week to give you and the rest of the time you're on your own. You don't need a lot of supervision; you need clear goals and trust.

Who you are not

You are not a junior or mid-level engineer ready to step up. This role doesn't have the supervision capacity for that.

You are not a research engineer who wants to spend three months on the perfect schema. We ship in four months. Pragmatism beats elegance every time.

You are not an “AI engineer” who has only built RAG demos and chatbots. We need someone who can build a backend that handles real money and real client data, who happens to use AI tools to do it.

You don't believe AI tools belong in production engineering. If that's your view, this is the wrong role.

Why this is worth your time

You'll help create a category. By December 2028, this company is either a $50M+ valuation business or a footnote. You will own a meaningful share of that outcome, and your work will be the visible technical foundation everyone else builds on.

You'll work directly with the founder, and through him with an Advisory Board that includes ex-PwC Global CIO leadership and a senior Grant Thornton partner. You'll present to them every six weeks.

You won't be one engineer in a forty-person team grinding on tickets. You'll be the second-most-senior person on a build that the entire company is watching.

Location and start

Remote. India strongly preferred. Mid-July 2026 start.

How to apply

Apply via LinkedIn

•    A short note on why this role specifically interests you. Two sentences. We read them. Generic applications go straight to no.

•    Your CV or LinkedIn.

•    A 5–8 minute Loom walking through one production system you've built with AI-orchestrated tools. Show us the architecture document, the testing approach, and one piece of code you're proud of. If you'd rather write than record, send the written equivalent — but the Loom helps us a lot.

•    If you have meaningful experience with both Claude Code and Codex, tell us how you'd think about choosing between them for a four-month B2B SaaS build with offshore engineering support. We don't expect a definitive answer — we want to see how you reason about the trade-off.

We will reply to every application within five working days. If we say no, we'll tell you why.