Forward-Deployed Engineer (Pre-Sales)
Location: US Remote; offices located in San Jose, CA and NYC, NY
Travel: Required for customer engagements; 25-40%
About Tessera Labs
Tessera Labs (backed by a16z, Foundation Capital) is building the agentic automation layer for the modern enterprise. Our AI platform, Tessera Mosaic, is deployed across the systems of record of the world's largest corporations, automating the most complex manual business workflows with superhuman quality and speed. Tessera deploys frontier AI agents across SAP, Oracle, Salesforce, Workday, ServiceNow, and others, disrupting the business transformation industry previously monopolized by System Integrators (SIs).
Role Summary
As a Forward-Deployed Engineer (FDE) at Tessera, you will be driving how global enterprises deploy AI at scale. You will own our most strategic customers and deployments, building and operationalizing AI automation in a category with no established playbook. You will be the technical arm to our GTM motion, embedding in Fortune 500 customers whose expectations were set by a world before AI. The solutions you deploy will replace mission-critical workflows in production that previously consumed thousands of human hours.
Tessera FDEs are AI engineers deployed in our pre-sales motions, carrying the torch from early customer validation until handoff to our Customer Success teams. You will develop relationships with top decision-makers at the world's most influential companies, and you will be exposed to the architectural intricacies and internal technical workings sustaining global corporations. You will operate with exceptional autonomy and ownership, and represent Tessera at the highest level.
You will sit at the intersection of the GTM, Product, Engineering, Center of Excellence, and Customer Success teams, owning customer engagements from pre-deployment to maturity. You will be responsible for understanding customer requirements, designing and building new systems at the frontier of our platform, architecting deployments, and accelerating deal cycles through technical presentations, technical writing, proofs-of-concept, hands-on-workshops, and training sessions.
This role is ideal for engineers and ex-founders who thrive under ambiguity and marry strong technical chops with intuitive people skills. Tessera FDEs are highly proactive problem-solvers, and have a keen ability to see around corners.
Responsibilities
Write code and build production software and workflows on top of the Tessera Mosaic platform
Conduct deep process discovery with customers, breaking down complex, ambiguous, cross-system problems into well-defined solutions
Build lightweight prototypes or workflows that showcase Tessera’s AI agents in real enterprise scenarios
Partner with GTM to clearly frame technical boundaries in sales engagements, producing technical collateral including Statements of Work
Collaborate with Infra and Engineering to architect implementations that scale and work consistently across high-volume, business-critical processes
Iterate closely with customers and cross-functional partners to drive adoption from pilot to full production
Ensure that field signal from the customer is transmitted to the Product and Engineering teams, helping shape our product strategy
Build long-term customer relationships and proactively identify new automation opportunities throughout engagements
Lead training and workshop sessions at customer sites to train and upskill Tessera Mosaic users on the platform
You May Be a Good Fit If You Have
2+ years of experience in a technical, customer-facing capacity such as Forward-Deployed Engineer, Solutions Engineer, Technical Program Manager, Software Engineering with sales or consulting experience, or former technical founder
Strong hands-on experience with Python and JavaScript/TypeScript
Experiencing building production-grade AI systems
Strong communication skills with both technical and non-technical stakeholders
Ability to operate effectively under ambiguity and fast-moving deployments
An ownership mentality and willingness to do whatever it takes to get deployments over the line
Willingness to travel to customer sites, primarily within the U.S.
Nice-To-Haves
Exposure to enterprise platforms such as SAP, Oracle, Salesforce, Workday, Snowflake, MuleSoft, or similar systems
Experience delivering technical presentations, demos, or PoCs to enterprise customers