We've been helping teams at some of the world's largest companies get SurrealDB into production. Now we're building a global team of Forward Deployed Engineers to do more of that work.
We're hiring engineers around the world to work alongside customer teams on SurrealDB and SurrealDB Agent Memory, from the first architecture decisions through to going live. We'll train and certify every engineer before their first customer engagement.
Why are we hiring?
When customers have needed help moving from a pilot to a system they could run in production, our engineers have joined them in their codebases. They've modelled data, built migrations, tuned queries and worked alongside the customer's engineers until the team was ready to run the platform themselves.
We want to do more of that work, and we need more engineers to do it.
Getting a database or an agent memory layer running is only part of the job. Teams also need to bring data across from existing systems, manage security, monitor what's happening and make sure the people running it understand how it works.
A Forward Deployed Engineer brings experience from the team that builds and runs SurrealDB into those decisions, working directly with the people who will live with them.
What you'll do
You'll work as part of a customer's engineering team, helping them build and run production systems with SurrealDB. You'll report to a SurrealDB engineering manager and work closely with our engineering and customer teams.
Depending on the project, you'll:
Work alongside the customer's engineers from architecture through to go-live.
Design data models in SurrealQL across documents, graph relations and vectors, and tune queries and indexes.
Build ingestion and migration pipelines from systems such as Cosmos DB, Postgres, MongoDB, vector databases and search services.
Keep a clear record of architecture decisions, progress and risks for weekly updates.
Work with the SurrealDB team on customer architecture and security questionnaires.
Help the customer's team learn through pair programming, reviews, workshops, runbooks and reference material.
The aim is to leave the team ready to own and run what you've built together.
Where you fit
We're looking for engineers who have worked in platform engineering, agentic AI, or both.
Platform engineering
You'll help customers run SurrealDB and Agent Memory in their own cloud or on SurrealDB Cloud. That includes networking, identity, secrets and access, CI/CD, and infrastructure as code with tools such as Terraform or OpenTofu.
You'll also work on observability, backups, upgrades, security reviews and performance testing. It helps if you've used containers, Kubernetes, Terraform, OpenTofu or Pulumi.
Agentic AI
You'll work on memory, retrieval and orchestration within the customer's agents. That could include implementing agent memory, designing retrieval workflows and building orchestration with services such as Azure OpenAI.
You'll help evaluate the system, put guardrails in place, monitor its behaviour and tune its performance in production. It helps if you've built with agent frameworks, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) and evaluation workflows.
The two side by side
| Platform engineering | Agentic AI | |
|---|---|---|
| Focus | Running SurrealDB and Agent Memory in the customer's cloud or on SurrealDB Cloud | Memory, retrieval and orchestration inside the customer's agents |
| You'll work on | Networking, identity, secrets, CI/CD, observability, backups, upgrades and performance testing | Agent memory, retrieval workflows, orchestration, evaluation, guardrails and tuning |
| It helps if you've used | Containers, Kubernetes, Terraform, OpenTofu or Pulumi | Agent frameworks, RAG and evaluation workflows |
How the roles work
The Forward Deployed Engineer team is a network of engineers we've approved in advance. When a suitable customer project comes up, we contact engineers whose background fits the work.
Each engagement is a contract, with its own duration, hours and location requirements. We welcome applications from around the world, and we'll confirm location eligibility early in the process.
Joining the team doesn't guarantee a contract. It means you've already been approved and will be among the first people we contact when a suitable project comes up. The customer makes the final selection for each engagement.
Some projects may require customer-provided equipment, background checks or occasional travel to the customer's site.
Who we're looking for
You don't need years of SurrealDB or agent memory experience. Very few people have that yet. We care more about how you approach engineering problems and how quickly you learn.
You should bring:
A track record of delivering agentic AI systems, cloud data platforms, or both, in production.
Database work beyond basic CRUD, including data modelling, indexes, query plans and migrations.
Time spent running services on at least one major cloud: AWS, Azure or GCP.
A working knowledge of Python, TypeScript, Go or Rust.
The ability to explain technical decisions clearly to engineers, architects, security teams and other stakeholders.
Hands-on experience with an agent memory tool such as Mem0, Graphiti, Zep, Letta, LangMem or Cognee is a strong plus. Personal and open-source projects count too.
We'd also welcome familiarity with Azure services such as AKS, Entra ID and Key Vault, observability tools or regulated environments.
Community contributors and SurrealDB Ambassadors are very welcome to apply.
Training and certification
Before your first customer engagement, you'll receive in-depth training on SurrealDB 4 and SurrealDB Agent Memory, followed by certification from our engineering team.
Along the way, you'll help enterprise teams take agentic AI from pilot to production. The work can also lead to future SurrealDB engagements and roles.
Apply
If this sounds like the kind of work you'd enjoy, take a look at the Forward Deployed Engineer roles on our careers page.
