Lead Python Developer

At Assail, our vision is to create specialized AI systems that secure technologies through "live fire" exercises. Our flagship platform, Ares, is an agentic AI system designed for continuous offensive cybersecurity operations of APIs and mobile applications.

Ares isn't just a scanner; it’s a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform that mimics a red team with machine speed. By utilizing up to 100 autonomous agents, Ares autonomously discovers, executes, and validates real exploit paths with human-in-the-loop oversight. We are currently scaling our "agentic core" and looking for a Lead Python Developer to own the engineering excellence behind Ares's brain.

We are seeking a Lead Python Developer to spearhead the development of our agentic offensive AI-SAST/DAST chaining and lateral reasoning engine. You will be responsible for the high-performance Python architecture that powers our Ares platform and its underlying orchestrator.

This is a critical hire focused on building a scalable Service-as-Software platform that can handle complex multi-tenant isolation, real-time agent monitoring, and seamless integration with enterprise ITSM/SIEM workflows.

You’ll own and evolve our Python-based microservices architecture. You’ll work directly with the founding team and report directly to the Chief AI Officer to ship features, scale infrastructure, and establish engineering practices as we grow.

• Architect & Build: Lead the development of the Ares agentic core, focusing on the orchestrator, Kafka REST proxies, and agent swarm monitoring systems.
• Security Integration: Build and maintain tools for automated mobile app deobfuscation, certificate pinning bypass, and API secret harvesting.
• Scalable Infrastructure: Design a multi-tenant environment with row-level security (RLS) and encrypted service-to-service communication via TLS 1.3.
• AI
  
  Collaboration:
  
  Work closely with our Chief AI Officer to integrate custom models trained on API and mobile hacking TTPs into a production‑ready SaaS environment.
• Platform Excellence: Lead the "Land and Expand" technical strategy by building CI/CD hooks and "Governed Exploit" modes for large enterprise estates.

• Expert Python Mastery: Extensive experience building complex, high‑concurrency systems in Python.
• SaS/Service-as-Software Background: Proven track record of building and scaling multi‑tenant SaS/SaaS platforms with complex usage‑based metering (token‑based models).
• Cybersecurity Domain Expertise (Plus): Previous experience building offensive or defensive security tools (SAST/DAST, penetration testing automation, or vulnerability management) is highly preferred.
• AI Engineering (Plus): Familiarity with agentic frameworks, LLM orchestration, or fine‑tuning custom models is a significant advantage.
• Leadership Mindset: Ability to mentor a growing engineering team.
• Postgre
  
  SQL (RDS), Redis (Elasti Cache), Kafka (MSK), MinIO
• Confluent Kafka, Web Sockets
• Next.js, React, Type Script, Tailwind CSS

• The Mission: You will be at the forefront of the shift to machine‑on‑machine cyber warfare.
• The Team: Work alongside a founding team of 26‑year security veterans, ex‑U.S. intelligence ops, and former Homeland Security directors.
• First engineering hire: massive impact on product and culture
• Work on genuinely hard problems at the intersection of AI and security
• Build something that makes software more secure at scale
• Competitive equity package reflecting early‑stage opportunity