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TRM Labs is seeking a Forward Deployed Engineer to work directly with US national security customers, deploying AI-powered intelligence platforms into their environments and building solutions that enable investigators to trace illicit activity and disrupt crime.
In this generalist engineering role, you will be the technical bridge between TRM's product teams and mission-critical government customers. You'll deploy and operate TRM's platform in both cloud and air-gapped environments, translate customer needs into working software, and own outcomes end-to-end. Your work spans application development, Kubernetes orchestration, cloud infrastructure, database design, and data pipelines—whatever the problem requires.
Key responsibilities include:
- Deploying, integrating, and operating TRM's platform in customer environments (cloud and air-gapped)
- Sitting directly with mission users to understand needs and prototype solutions
- Delivering across multiple technical domains: application code, Kubernetes, AWS infrastructure, databases, and data flows
- Acting as the technical liaison between customers and TRM's product/engineering teams
- Diagnosing and resolving complex problems in constrained, resource-limited environments
Required qualifications:
- Strong programming ability in Python and/or Node.js/TypeScript, with demonstrated fluency in AI development (coding agents, LLM tooling)
- Hands-on Kubernetes experience: deploying, debugging, and reasoning about real workloads
- Production AWS experience building environments from scratch
- Working fluency with relational databases (PostgreSQL or similar): schema design, query tuning, data migration
- Demonstrated range: concrete examples of delivering outside your primary specialty
- Outstanding written and verbal communication skills; comfort presenting technical solutions to non-technical stakeholders is essential
Bonus skills (not required):
- Infrastructure as code (Terraform) and GitOps (Argo CD)
- Data engineering at scale (orchestration, streaming, analytics stores)
- Distributed systems design and debugging
- Machine learning or agentic systems development
- Deep Linux/Unix and networking expertise, especially in restricted or disconnected environments
- Prior experience delivering in classified or regulated government environments
The team is small, senior, and high-trust. Everyone owns a complete surface area end-to-end with no ticket queues. You'll align to US Eastern hours with a mix of on-site and remote work, communicating across multiple channels (Slack, Signal, secure email, Google Meet). Weekly team syncs and project check-ins keep work tracked in Linear with rapid issue escalation. TRM operates at high velocity with rapid issue resolution, efficient navigation of bureaucratic hurdles, and knowledge transfer via current documentation.
