CTO / Technical Co-Founder (LLM-based AI Mental Health Platform) Vila Nova de Gaia

CTO / Technical Co-Founder (LLM-based AI Mental Health Platform)
Vila Nova de Gaia
Vila Nova de Gaia, Porto District, Portugal

At Backsie Inc (Permanent)

Salary: €100. 000 - €120. 000

Expires at: 2026-01-26

Remote policy: Global remote About the Role We’re seeking a highly skilled CTO / Technical Co-Founder with deep expertise in LLM-based AI,
- agent architectures, and
- AI interaction. You’ll own the technology vision and guide Backsie’s evolution from MVP to scalable platform as we prepare for venture financing in Q1 2026. This is not a
- off position — you’ll conduct a full technical audit, design the future architecture, expand the engineering team, and ensure that all AI systems are robust,
- latency, and emotionally intelligent. You’ll collaborate closely with the CEO (based in New York) and a distributed team across time zones. Key Responsibilities  • Lead overall AI and software architecture, ensuring scalability, resilience, and data integrity • Oversee development of LLM orchestration and guardrail agents for emotionally nuanced conversations • Build and manage the engineering team, CI/CD pipelines, and Dev
Ops infrastructure • Develop RAG systems, custom datasets, and regression testing frameworks • Collaborate with product and research to align emotional intelligence with logical structure • Represent the technical vision to investors and partners

Main requirements • 5 + years in AI, ML, or NLP engineering (including
- level LLM systems) • Experience with Lang
Chain , Open
AI API , or comparable frameworks • Solid grasp of agentic design , API-centric architecture , data pipelines , and testing automation

• Proven ability to lead technical teams in startups or
- paced environments • Excellent communication skills and collaborative mindset

Nice to have • Prior startup or
- founder experience• Familiarity with
- health, wellbeing, or CBT/DBT frameworks• Experience balancing safety/guardrail mechanisms and empathy in LLM products

Benefits & Perks Compensation & Equity  • Equity: 8 – 15 % (vesting over 48 months / 83b eligible) • Salary (post-funding): up to $200 K USD (competitive with U. S. standards) • Early-stage stipend or consulting arrangement may be offered until fundraising closes

Why Join Us

You’ll be shaping the foundation of a product with the potential to redefine how people reflect, reason, and heal with AI. Backsie is early enough that your contributions will shape its DNA — from technical architecture to team culture — yet mature enough to have a clear path to funding and market. We value emotional intelligence, technical depth, and
- term commitment. If you’re ready to build something that truly matters, let’s talk