Forward-deployed Software Engineer

Position Summary

GripFusion is building the next generation of sports performance technology with Tactile Intelligence. As our Forward-Deployed Software Engineer, you will expand every surface where GripFusion meets the athlete, from the ForceBall to the iPad, mobile, and web experiences that turn tactile data into decisions.

This is a product-facing engineering role reporting to Will Shawn, Head of Software. You will work across the full stack, spend time with players and coaches to understand how they use novel tactile data, and turn what you learn into shipped product. You will bring design and athlete thinking to every decision.

You will work alongside our product, embedded, data science, and design teams to build new visualizations, connect GripFusion to the systems our customers already use, and carry common design practices across our baseball and golf platforms.

What You'll Build

- The iPad app. Extend and harden our primary product, built in React Native on an AWS backend and used by teams today.
- The web dashboard. Build a new React dashboard where coaches and staff review sessions, compare athletes, and share insights.
- The mobile app. Build a mobile app that communicates directly with the ForceBall and supports broader use cases at the field.
- Novel visualizations. Invent new ways to show tactile and athlete data, including 3D graphics that make the invisible obvious.
- Integrations. Pull in data from the other systems teams already use, so GripFusion fits naturally into their workflow.
- The golf platform. Contribute to our golf product and carry common design patterns and components across baseball and golf.

Key Responsibilities

- Work across the full stack, from BLE device communication and cloud services to mobile and web interfaces.
- Partner with players, coaches, and team staff to understand user needs and how they interact with tactile data.
- Balance quick prototyping and discovery with production-level engineering, testing, and deployment.
- Work with design to shape the user experience, and establish shared design practices across verticals.
- Partner with embedded and data science to define device data transmission, state handling, and data formats.
- Visit MLB teams to test with athletes and coaches, and bring product thinking back to the software stack.
- Use AI development tools every day, and help shape how the software team builds with them.

Desired Skills & Qualifications

- 4+ years shipping production software across mobile and web, ideally with React Native, React, and TypeScript.
- Full-stack experience, including cloud backends on AWS and the CI/CD and release pipelines that get apps to users.
- A track record of working directly with clients, users, or stakeholders to shape what gets built.
- Daily, hands-on use of AI coding tools and agentic workflows.
- Experience with hardware systems, Bluetooth or other device data transmission, and device state diagrams (preferred).
- Offline-first mobile architecture and on-device data analysis (preferred).
- Data visualization or 3D graphics on web or mobile, such as three.js, WebGL, or React Three Fiber (preferred).
- Experience integrating third-party data sources and APIs (preferred).
- Bachelor's degree in computer science or a related field.

Who You Are

- An owner. You take product and technical ownership end to end, from first conversation to shipped feature.
- A builder who explores. You love quick prototypes and discovery, but you know when a prototype needs to become a product.
- Product- and design-minded. You care about how an experience feels, not just whether it works.
- An athlete at heart. You have competed or coached, and you understand how players train, compete, and take feedback.
- A great communicator. You are as comfortable in a clubhouse with players and coaches as you are in a code review.
- AI-first. You embrace AI tools as a core part of how you design, build, and ship.

Impact & Growth

This role is designed to grow with the company. You will shape how GripFusion shows up for athletes and coaches across every surface we build. As our baseball and golf platforms expand, you will have a seat at the table on product direction, design practices, and how our AI-first engineering team works.

Compensation & Benefits

- Base salary: $110,000 to $145,000, commensurate with experience.
- Equity: 0.1% to 0.25%.
- Benefits: Healthcare, dental, vision, and retirement matching.

Work Environment

- Full-time, in-person role based at GripFusion's Performance Lab headquarters in Ann Arbor, MI, including our in-house pitching lab, with up to 10% travel to MLB/NCAA teams and partners.
- Collaborative, innovation-first startup environment working across hardware, firmware, software, design, and data science.
- Direct access to leadership and the opportunity to build a new category of sports performance technology from the ground up.
- Career development opportunities and professional growth.
- Family first, with a close-knit team that enjoys solving hard problems.