Backend Engineer (Madrid) — v2 brief

Backend Engineer — Reversa AI (Madrid). Updated brief from Tomás Burgaleta, 20 Jul 2026, replacing the previous FDE profile. Tight timeline: aiming to close within two weeks.

Reversa AI (RegTech / AI) is hiring a PURE BACKEND ENGINEER. This replaces the forward-deployed-engineer profile — no client-facing/account-management emphasis needed.

REQUIREMENTS:

1. Proven track record of building things INDEPENDENTLY — side projects, open source, launched products. This is the signal the founders value most. Candidates whose profile only shows feature work inside someone else's team, with no personal artifacts, do not clear the bar.
2. Strong sense of ownership over what they ship.
3. Big plus: founded/co-founded something, or built something substantial solo.
4. Willing to work from Madrid, Spain — NON-NEGOTIABLE, in person. Not a nice-to-have. Candidates must be in Madrid or explicitly relocating to Madrid; elsewhere-in-Spain only if clearly willing to relocate.

TECHNICAL BAR (calibration): previous candidate Guido was liked personally but was "not quite there yet on the technical side" — the technical bar must be HIGH. Look for real backend depth: API design, databases, infra, distributed systems, production systems serving real users. AI/LLM experience valued (company builds with modern AI tooling; Python/TypeScript stack, Postgres, cloud).

EXCELLENCE PROXIES (apply even though not formally required): strong technical universities (Spain: ICAI, ETSII-UPM, UPC, UAM, UCM; international: MIT, Stanford, CMU, ETH, EPFL, Cambridge, Oxford, Imperial, TU Munich) or strong companies (BigTech, frontier AI labs, funded startups) — OR an outstanding independent-builder record (impressive GitHub/OSS, launched products with users) which counts equally.

ANTI-PATTERNS: pure frontend engineers; consultants/agency engineers with no personal builds; profiles with zero public artifacts and no startup/founder signal; anyone who cannot be in Madrid.

Employment: full-time, EU work authorization, onsite Madrid. Comp: competitive early-stage package + equity.