{"id":463174,"url":"https://alion.io/job/apollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product","title":"Full-stack Software Engineer (Product)","company":{"id":178413,"name":"Apollo Research","domain":"apolloresearch.ai","url":"https://alion.io/company/apollo-research","size_band":"51-200","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Lever","truth_index":null},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"middle","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["London, United Kingdom"],"countries":["GB"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":222000,"max":290000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":290000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":4,"visa_sponsorship":true,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Claude Code","optional":false},{"name":"Cursor","optional":false},{"name":"LLM","optional":false},{"name":"OpenAI Codex","optional":false},{"name":"SIEM","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":true},{"name":"TypeScript","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-08-28T08:40:40Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-08-28","last_verified_at":"2026-11-01T22:27:28Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":65,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":65},"description":"THE OPPORTUNITY\nWe are buildingWatcher, a coding agent security product. Watcher is deployed in production and monitors billions of agent tokens per month across engineering teams at agent-building scale-ups and enterprises. We are looking for a product engineer to build and scale Watcher end to end.\nThis role includes backend and frontend components. You will own features across the full stack, from agent hooks and ingestion pipelines to monitoring dashboards and enterprise integrations. You can expect to own features from customer conversation to production deployment.\nThis is truly a “start-up role”: you will own big chunks of the product, make decisions fast, and ship at high volume. You will join a small team with significant ability to shape the product and tech, and you can earn more responsibility quickly. This is an individual contributor role but could lead to management responsibilities eventually, if desired.\nKEY RESPONSIBILITIES\nShip product end to end (~45%)\nFeature development\nDesign, build, and ship Watcher features across the stack: agent-side hooks and CLI tooling, ingestion and grading pipelines, real-time monitoring UI (Watcher Live), and the organization-wide Analyzer dashboard.\n\nOwn features end to end, from ambiguous requirements to production: talk to users, scope the work, make the technical decisions, put that into production, and iterate based on usage.\n\nBuild Watcher integrations: We currently support Claude Code and Codex, but we’re planning on increasing our coverage to other coding agents, LLM gateways, and anywhere that could benefit from agent monitoring.\n\nBuild the policy and configuration layer that lets security teams set org-wide guardrails for engineers to operate safely within.\n\nProductionize research\nTurn monitoring research (new monitors, grading strategies, backtesting results) into production-ready product features. We are \"our own customer\": You will use the product you build every day.\n\nInfrastructure and scale (~35%)\nDesign and operate backend systems that process large volumes of agent logs in real time.\n\nOwn reliability: robust error handling, graceful degradation, and observability (logging, metrics, tracing, alerting). We should catch issues before customers do.\n\nArchitect data models and storage that handle both high-throughput writes and complex analytical queries over historical trajectories. Retention policies have to fit highly sensitive customer data.\n\nMake sure Watcher is safe to deploy: Work with our AI Security & Control Engineer on tenant isolation, encryption, and access controls. Watcher touches some of the most sensitive data our customers have.\n\nCustomer and integration engineering (~20%)\nBuild and maintain integrations with the enterprise security stack, e.g. streaming monitoring alerts into SIEM systems and existing security operations workflows.\n\nSupport flexible deployment models: cloud-hosted, on-prem, and local backends, so sensitive agent logs never have to leave customer control.\n\nTalk to customers, debug issues in their environments, and feed what you learn back into the roadmap.\n\nREPRESENTATIVE PROJECTS\nSecure a new frontier coding agent: Take an agent we don't yet support (e.g. Cursor) from zero to fully monitored. Build the hook/integration layer, normalize its trajectory format into our data model, validate monitor accuracy on real traffic, and ship it to customers.\n\nBuild the real-time blocking path: Design the low-latency pipeline that lets monitors block dangerous actions (e.g. git push --force, secret exfiltration) before they execute, while keeping p95 latency low enough that developers don't feel it. Handle traffic spikes and partial failures gracefully.\n\nShip an Analyzer capability end to end: Design and build an organization-wide view (e.g. failure trends over time, cross-session pattern detection) from data model through API to UI, based on what security teams actually need.\n\nDeploy Watcher inside locked-down enterprises: Build and document the self-hosted/on-prem deployment story so that enterprises with strict data requirements can run Watcher inside their own infrastructure.\n\nJOB REQUIREMENTS\nMust-haves\n4+ years building production software. You have shipped and operated real systems with real users, and you know what it takes to keep them reliable.\n\nFull-stack capability. You are strong on the backend (APIs, data pipelines, databases, cloud infrastructure) and productive on the frontend (modern web UI). You don't need to be world-class at both, but you must be able to own a feature across the whole stack. Our stack is primarily Python and TypeScript.\n\nHigh agency and ownership. You are willing to own big chunks of the product, make decisions fast with incomplete information, and be accountable for the outcome. You don't wait to be told what to do and have an accurate sense of the roadmap for the product.\n\nHigh output volume. You have used Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, or similar tools heavily to accelerate or have built agents or agent tooling yourself.\n\nStartup pace. You are excited about a fast-moving environment, comfortable with ambiguity and changing priorities, and willing to grind when it matters.\n\nProduct sense. You can talk to users, translate vague requirements into concrete designs, and make good calls about what to build and what to cut.\n\nStrong nice-to-haves\nPrevious work on developer tools, monitoring/observability systems, or security products. Watcher sits at the intersection of all three.\n\nReal-time or large-scale data processing experience (streaming pipelines, message queues, high-throughput log systems).\n\nEnterprise or on-prem deployment experience. Shipping software into environments you don't control is its own skill.\n\nExperience building LLM-powered applications, e.g. LLM-as-judge setups, evaluation pipelines, or familiarity with frameworks like Inspect.\n\nEarly-stage startup experience. You have been employee 1-15 somewhere and know what it feels like to build a product with no playbook.\n\nExplicitly not required\nFormal AI safety background. We need excellent product engineers who can learn the AI safety context, not AI safety researchers who need to learn engineering.\n\nManagement experience. This is an IC role, at least initially.\n\nDeep experience in every technology we use. We care about demonstrated ability to learn and ship, not checkbox familiarity with our exact stack.\n\nWe want to emphasize that people who feel they don’t fulfill all of these characteristics but think they would be a good fit for the position, nonetheless, are strongly encouraged to apply.\nBENEFITS\nThis role offers market competitive salary, equity, and competitive benefits.\n\nSalary: San Francisco: $222,000 - $290,000 London: £149,000 - £195,000. We will be looking to meaningfully raise salaries soon.\n\nOur engineers effectively have an unlimited token budget. If a better result costs more compute, use it.\n\nFlexible work hours and schedule\n\nUnlimited vacation\n\nUnlimited sick leave\n\nUp to 6 months of paid parental leave\n\nComprehensive health, dental and vision insurance\n\nRetirement savings with competitive employer matching (e.g. 401(k) for US employees)\n\nLunch, dinner, and snacks are provided for all employees on workdays\n\nPaid work trips, including staff retreats, business trips, and relevant conferences\n\nA yearly $1,000 (USD) professional development budget\n\nRelocation support and visa fees (if applicable)\n\nLOGISTICS\nTime Allocation: Full-time\n\nLocation: This is an in-person role working out of our London or San Francisco office. We offer flexible working hours and some wfh arrangements.\n\nVisa sponsorship: We sponsor visas in both the UK and US. Sponsorship isn't guaranteed for every role or candidate, but if we make you an offer, we'll work with you to find the right visa route.","description_format":"text","description_chars":7809,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":4,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["Equity","Flexible schedule","Parental leave","Professional development","Vision insurance"],"hiring_locations":[],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":true,"industries":["AI Safety & Alignment"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-06T11:37:30Z"}],"visa":[{"country":"GB","licensed_sponsor":true,"evidence":"Licensed UK visa sponsor (Skilled Worker, Senior or Specialist Worker)","filings_12m":null,"filings_prev_12m":null,"green_card_filings_12m":null,"median_offered_wage_usd":null,"route":"Skilled Worker; Global Business Mobility: Senior or Specialist Worker","cap_exempt":false,"checked_at":"2026-10-31T06:23:40+00:00","sources":["UK Home Office: register of licensed sponsors (workers)"],"filings_for_role_12m":0}],"liveness":{"score":23,"band":"cold","label":"Long shot","p_open":0.4,"p_active":0.787,"p_room":0.72,"age_days":64,"expected_fill_days":101,"reasons":["seen:64","win:mid","crowd:"],"computed_at":"2026-11-01T06:10:25Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":290000,"is_top_pay":true},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/apollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/apollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-11-01T22:58:37Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":34989,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-02T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":178413},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=178413"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fapollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fapollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fapollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/apollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fapollo-research-full-stack-software-engineer-product"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":463174}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"apolloresearch.ai","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":463174},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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