What does a Forward Deployed Engineer do at CLERA?

Forward Deployed Engineers at CLERA are embedded directly with enterprise customers to implement and customize the platform, build integrations, and solve technical problems in real-world client environments. They combine software engineering skills with direct customer interaction, writing production code while also serving as the primary technical point of contact.

What skills are required for this Customer Engineer role?

The Customer Engineer role at CLERA typically requires strong software engineering skills (Python, TypeScript, SQL), experience with APIs and system integration, comfort with cloud platforms, and the ability to communicate complex technical topics to non-technical stakeholders. Most FDE roles require 3-7 years of engineering experience.

Is this Forward Deployed Engineer position at CLERA remote?

Remote availability varies by CLERA FDE role. Some positions are fully remote, others require travel to customer sites, and some are hybrid. Check the full job description above for the specific location requirements for this posting.

CLERA

Customer Engineer

San Francisco, CA, US Mid Posted July 31, 2026

Apply on Indeed All FDE Jobs

Role Description

About the Role

We're a fast-growing, Y Combinator–backed AI voice platform (Seed stage) helping B2C companies automate their customer call operations — from sales and lead qualification to support and scheduling — across millions of calls and 30+ languages. Our small but mighty team (11–50 people) is based in Berlin, and we're looking for a Customer Engineer to join our technical customer-success function.

In this role, you'll sit at the intersection of engineering, product, and customers. You'll be a trusted technical partner to the businesses adopting our platform, helping them get real value quickly — and feeding their insights back into what we build. This role has a direct, measurable impact on customer satisfaction and the real-world performance of our AI technology.

What You'll Do

Provide hands-on technical guidance to customers as they deploy, configure, and optimise our platform for their specific use cases.
Troubleshoot Postgres-backed data workflows and frontend/backend code (TypeScript, React, Node, Python) alongside customers.
Help customers design and refine prompting and AI agent workflows to unlock maximum value from the platform.
Build and maintain strong customer relationships, acting as the primary technical liaison between customers and our product/engineering teams.
Gather, synthesise, and communicate customer feedback to drive product improvements, documentation, and roadmap decisions.

What We're Looking For

Must-haves:

2+ years of Software Engineering experience with demonstrable business impact through written code.
Solid familiarity with PostgreSQL and comfort troubleshooting data workflows.
Hands-on experience with TypeScript, React, Node.js, and Python.
Some form of customer-facing experience — whether in a support, solutions engineering, or consulting capacity.
Ability to help customers craft and iterate on prompts and AI agent configurations (prompt engineering / social engineering mindset).

Nice-to-haves:

Strong CS fundamentals.
Genuine interest in AI, LLMs, and conversational AI products.
Experience in B2C SaaS, CRM integrations (Salesforce, HubSpot), or telephony/voice platforms.
A pragmatic, ship-fast mindset — you prefer iterating quickly over waiting for perfection.

Location & Work Arrangement

On-site in Berlin, Germany.
Visa sponsorship is available.

Why Join

Work at the cutting edge of conversational AI and voice automation.
Direct influence on product direction through close customer collaboration.
Small, high-calibre team with a fast-moving, low-bureaucracy culture.
Backed by top-tier investors at the Seed stage — early enough to matter, funded enough to build.

About Forward Deployed Engineering

Forward Deployed Engineers are embedded directly with customers to build custom solutions, integrate products into existing infrastructure, and bridge the gap between product engineering and customer success. The role combines deep technical skills with the ability to operate in client environments and translate business requirements into working software.

Originally pioneered by Palantir, the FDE model has spread across AI, enterprise SaaS, and cloud infrastructure companies. FDEs write production code, architect integrations, train customer teams, and feed product insights back to the core engineering organization. At companies like OpenAI, Salesforce, and Databricks, FDE teams are treated as elite engineering units that can ship custom solutions in days rather than quarters.

Typical FDE stack: Python, TypeScript, SQL, REST/GraphQL APIs, cloud platforms (AWS/GCP/Azure), and increasingly LLM APIs and AI orchestration frameworks. Strong communication and the ability to context-switch between technical and business conversations are as important as coding ability.