About the role
Vannevar is a defense technology company building AI to deter our adversaries. In the 21st century, conflict moves at algorithmic speed and foresight equals firepower. Our agentic AI is purpose-built to compete with China—from cross-Strait conflict to gray zone coercion. Trained on the most mission-relevant datasets in defense, our technology models adversary behavior, simulates campaigns, and recommends the best course of action to decision makers. Our AI systems are some of the most trusted in the industry and actively used on the front lines of the Indo-Pacific to keep the peace and save lives.
Exceptional technology starts with exceptional people. Vannevar is a small agile team combining world-class engineers with veteran strategists who bring deep expertise in defense and tradecraft. We’re building a company defined by mission impact, user empathy, and disciplined growth. In just three years, we grew from $3M to $80M in ARR, achieved early profitability, and reached unicorn status—proving that disruption doesn’t require an ego, and staying power doesn’t mean standing still.
About the role
Vannevar is seeking an experienced full-stack engineer to advance the design and implementation of our Decision Advantage product. This critical platform enables defense and intelligence operators to gain comprehensive situational awareness of the information environment, helping them understand and counter adversary influence operations and information warfare tactics. You will build the applications our warfighters and intelligence analysts use daily for mission-critical work, developing advanced products and features for information distillation, analysis, and visualization that enable rapid assessment of the information environment. Working alongside designers, engineers, subject matter experts, and operational users, you will transform complex intelligence requirements into intuitive, mission-ready workflows that directly support national security objectives.
In this role, you will work in a small cross-functional team focused on delivering Decision Advantage capabilities to defense customers engaged in strategic competition with near-peer adversaries. You will work on all aspects of the product - everything from data (extraction, ingestion), backend (storage, indexing, APIs), frontend, AI analysis (agents), and more. The platform has a strong foundation to build upon and there is a ton a opportunity to make an impact as we take it to the next level.
Note: this role is also open to staff+ candidates.
What you’ll do
- Design, build, and ship a cutting edge identity search platform using TypeScript, React, Tailwind, and Node.js
- Partner with customers, mission owners, designers, and other engineers to understand user workflows and create 10x better solutions for their problems
- Implement and maintain search and agentic AI systems for high-scale data, both tabular and graph shaped
- Help define and shape the future of the product
What we’re looking for
- 5+ years of professional software development experience
- Expertise in TypeScript, Node.js, Postgres, and AWS
- Hands-on experience with at least one major search engine (e.g., Elasticsearch, OpenSearch)
- Prior experience working in a user-facing product role
Nice to Have
- Active Security clearance or ability to obtain one and desire to travel to visit users, collect feedback, and debug issues
- Prior experience developing AI-native products
- Understanding of search concepts like indexing, ranking, query parsing, and tokenization
What we offer
- Health, dental, and vision insurance
- Remote friendly with WeWork access
- Unlimited PTO, shared downtime during the federal holiday calendar, and company-wide off time at the end of each year
- 401(k) match
- Lifestyle & wellbeing stipends
- Salary top-up during military reserve duty
- Fully paid parental leave
- Child and pet care reimbursement during travel
We are committed to protecting the privacy of all applicants. Official emails from the company will come from an @vannevarlabs.com domain. Under no circumstances will a legitimate representative from our company contact you to request passwords, financial information, or other sensitive personal data. Please be vigilant of potential scams.
