Building Australia's AI engineering teams
Specialist recruitment for AI and ML engineers, and the product engineers shipping AI into production.
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Built in the AI era
We run our own sourcing and research on AI agents, so we know what production AI experience looks like, and can tell it apart from a weekend demo.
We place AI engineers into startups and scaleups across Australia, from founding hires to the people who lead the team.
We're a specialised founder led recruitment company made for growth markets where talent availability is scarce.
Precise, not high-volume
We meet every candidate, and understand you, the role and the team before we go to market. Fewer, better candidates with clear context on why they are relevant.
Highly technical
We speak the same language as the engineers we hire. Built for growth markets where talent is scarce, we map the whole market so you meet everyone worth meeting.
Ethics beyond all else
The right hire propels you; the wrong hire is a cost you cannot waste. We tell you what we see, even when it costs us a placement.
How the market is changing
AI tools now write a growing share of the code, and the models change every few months. The engineers our clients compete for pair strong fundamentals with the judgement to use AI well, so we hire for how people think rather than which tools they've used.
Systems thinking
Seeing how models, data and product fit together, and where the whole system can fail.
High agency
Taking ownership of a problem and moving it forward without waiting to be told.
Communication
Explaining what a model can and can't do to founders, customers and non-technical teams.
Product awareness
Knowing which AI features users actually need, and building those first.
From stealth to an embedded hiring partner
Pre-Series A AI startup, chemical intelligence software
Their VC introduced us while they were still in stealth. We've since become an embedded talent partner, speaking almost daily and trusted for hiring, role design and leadership planning.
When we met the founders they were taking more than 25 interviews a week without surfacing good candidates. We calibrated hard early. Hires since include an AI-native staff engineer with leadership capability, an ex-founding engineer from a health AI scaleup and a frontend engineer with Canva editor experience.
“George sends you people you will want to speak to. He filters hard before anything reaches us, protecting our time. It feels less like using a recruiter and more like having a hiring partner inside the team.”
Co-founder and CTO · AI startup
Common questions
AI moves fast. How do you identify the right talent?
We hire for foundations, not this month's tools. The strongest AI engineers have a proven ability to learn and adapt: they've picked up new models, frameworks and techniques as they've appeared, and shipped with them. We're cautious of candidates whose experience centres on approaches the field has already moved past.
What skills matter most in AI engineering right now?
Strong engineering fundamentals, plus the judgement to evaluate a model, design around its failure modes and ship something users rely on. Knowing a particular framework matters far less, because the frameworks keep changing.
Can you hire our first AI engineer?
Yes. We've hired AI engineers into founding teams, including an AI-native staff engineer for a pre-Series A startup. We'll help you define the role first: a founding AI engineer at seed is a different hire from an ML engineer joining a scaleup's platform team.
What are your fees?
We're founder led, so we're flexible. We have several ways of working, from a success fee on permanent hires to embedded hiring support, and we often build bespoke pricing for clients with specific needs. We're also always happy to have a chat and advise on hiring plans, role design or salary, with no fee. We love doing it, and it's often where we have the most impact.
Where do you hire?
We're based in Sydney and hire across Australia, including Melbourne, for on-site, hybrid and remote roles. We also place engineers in San Francisco.
Hiring AI engineers? Let’s chat.
A live role or a sense-check on the market. Virtual, or in person in Sydney.
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