We’re hiring an AI Engineer to build the intelligence layer for the leading AI companion for language learning. You’ll own the core AI systems powering personalized conversations for millions of users.
Language learning shouldn’t feel like an app — it should feel like talking to someone who knows you: remembers what you struggled with last week, adapts in real time, and responds instantly.
Building that means solving hard systems problems at consumer scale: long-term memory, real-time speech, sub-second latency, adaptive dialogue, and personalized content.
About Pingo
Pingo helps 8,000,000+ users build fluency through real conversations. Since launching in January 2025, we’ve grown to $12 million ARR with ~50% MoM growth. Backed by Y Combinator and top investors, we’re building a small, talent-dense team obsessed with product quality and engineering rigor.
What You’ll Do
In one sentence: Build the systems that make Pingo the default way people learn languages.
Define and own our AI architecture and roadmap, and build the AI team as we scale.
Architect memory & personalization — design scalable long-term memory and retrieval, build a content engine that generates structured, high-novelty conversations.
Improve speech & conversation intelligence — optimize ASR feedback, turn-taking, and dialogue flow to make interactions feel natural.
Own AI evals & experimentation system — build prompt simulations, golden datasets, and regression systems to measure conversation quality.
Optimize real-time performance — drive sub-200ms latency and systems that scale efficiently across millions of conversations.
Tie intelligence directly to retention — build systems and metrics that measurably improve D1/D7/D30 engagement.
You might be a great fit if you:
Think in systems. Understand how memory, latency, evaluation, and UX interact.
Set a high engineering bar — nothing ships broken.
Strong product judgement — you build features that feel instant and magical.
Run rigorous experiments and measure tradeoffs across quality, latency, and cost.
Detail-oriented & obsessed with quality – care deeply about stability, polish, and learning impact.
Skills Required
- Experience building production AI systems and architecture
- Experience designing scalable long-term memory and retrieval systems
- Experience with real-time speech systems, ASR, and conversational dialogue
- Proven ability to optimize for sub-second latency at consumer scale
- Experience building evaluation, experimentation, and regression testing systems for AI
- Strong product judgment and ability to run rigorous experiments
- Attention to quality, stability, and measurable retention metrics
- Experience hiring or leading an AI team (founding/early-stage preferred)
What We Do
Pingo is an AI-powered language-learning app that helps people build fluency through spoken conversation. Available on iOS and Android, it supports practice in more than 25 languages and offers instruction in 15+ native languages. Its AI tutor listens, corrects learners in real time, and creates personalized learning plans, while a free trial and Pingo Pro provide access to additional conversations and lessons.
