Forward Deployed Engineer

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Realm is an AI platform for mining companies that reduces costly downtime and increases yield, unlocking millions in profit. Realm integrates with existing cameras, sensors, and control systems to detect and predict equipment failures, flag unsafe behavior, automate responses, and notify key personnel. Our customers include major American coal mines as well as gemstone and oil & gas operations internationally.

As our first Forward Deployed Engineer, you will be the technical point of contact for customers in the field—owning integrations, onsite deployment work, and the translation of real‑world operational needs into robust, scalable technical solutions. You’ll work hands‑on with customer systems, troubleshoot complex environments, and rapidly prototype tools and integrations needed to make Realm successful in mission‑critical settings. This role is deeply technical and field‑oriented—focused on making the product work seamlessly in demanding industrial and government environments.

You’ll embed with users, uncover operational realities, validate technical assumptions, and ensure our technology performs reliably under real‑world constraints. This is an ideal role for someone who enjoys building in messy environments, thrives on customer interaction, and takes pride in shipping solutions that matter.

• Spend ~50% of your time onsite with customers across the US.
• Build a ground‑truth understanding of customer operations—shadowing operators, analysts, and frontline teams to understand workflows, constraints, and integration requirements.
• Rapidly prototype tools and integrations in the field (“vibe‑coding”) to validate ideas, solve urgent problems, and prove feasibility before handing off to engineering.
• Troubleshoot and diagnose complex operational or systems issues across varied and sometimes degraded environments.
• Translate field insights into clear technical requirements and integration specs for the engineering team.
• Lead all technical integration work, including APIs, data pipelines, hardware/software interfaces, and security/compliance‑sensitive deployment setups.
• Work closely with engineering to ensure features, interfaces, and infrastructure align with real‑world operational needs.
• Represent customer technical realities internally—ensuring feasibility, reliability, and operational constraints are deeply understood.
• Decompose ambiguous, real‑world problems into well‑scoped technical work streams.
• Ensure customers succeed in mission‑critical contexts by enabling smooth deployment, data flow, connectivity, and operational reliability.
• Inform the product and engineering teams with data, field observations, and frontline feedback—advocating for changes that reflect true customer needs.
• Contribute to the foundation, process, and culture that will scale Realm’s forward‑deployed engineering function.

• 2+ years of software engineering or forward‑deployed / mission operations experience, with a record of shipping impactful work.
• Strong technical fluency and the ability to work closely with engineers—comfortable reading, writing, and debugging code enough to build prototypes.
• Low ego, high EQ, and exceptional collaborative instincts—able to build trust inside Realm and with external partners.
• Experience working directly with enterprise, industrial, government, defense, or security‑critical products.
• Strong coding skills, problem‑solving ability, and grasp of computer science fundamentals.
• Mastery of core development/infrastructure/Dev Ops tools (Git, Linux).
• Demonstrated ability to lead cross‑functional problem solving, influence technical teams, and drive projects from inception to delivery.
• Ability to thrive in ambiguous environments—strong prioritization, structured thinking, and comfort balancing long‑term vision with immediate needs.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, able to simplify complexity for a wide range of stakeholders.
• Strong data instincts—comfortable analyzing data, forming hypotheses, and making data‑informed decisions.
• Hands‑on…