Team Lead, Ecosystems

Ambient.ai
Redwood City, US
Hybrid

Who this role is best for

A natural match if you have experience building and managing access control integrations and leading technical partnerships.

Best fit for

  • Candidates with a background in access control systems and team leadership experience in software engineering
    — “Deep experience with access control systems, from the software side ... or the hardware side”
  • Individuals who have led or managed integration projects with third-party systems
    — “A track record of shipping and operating integrations with third-party systems”
  • Candidates who have experience defining and executing technical strategies for enterprise-level partners
    — “Be the primary engineering contact for PACS and hardware partners ... joint roadmap planning”

Things to consider

  • The role requires hands-on technical involvement alongside management responsibilities
    — “Stay hands-on: review designs, unblock hard debugging, and write code where it moves the team fastest”
  • Candidates must be prepared to manage on-call duties and maintain production systems
    — “Set up the operating model for integrations in production: monitoring, on-call, partner escalation paths”

How to stand out

  • Highlight your experience with both PACS integrations and new product development in your resume
    — “The team's work ranges from building and maintaining PACS integrations ... to developing new access control products”
  • Emphasize your ability to negotiate and manage technical relationships with external partners
    — “Negotiate API access, SDK support, test hardware, and escalation commitments”
  • Showcase your backend and distributed systems expertise, especially spanning hardware and cloud
    — “Strong backend and distributed systems judgment, including systems that span customer-site hardware and the cloud”
Pace · Fast PacedCollaboration · HighAutonomy · HighDecision Impact · Team

Derived from job-description analysis by Serendipath's career intelligence engine.

What success looks like

  • hiring and growing a team of backend and integration engineers
  • setting direction and priorities for PACS integrations and new product development
  • representing Ambient.ai credibly with partner engineering and product leaders
Typical background
experience in software engineeringbackground in team managementknowledge of physical security systems

Skills & requirements

Required

Team ManagementBackend DevelopmentIntegration EngineeringArchitecture

Preferred

Product ManagementPartner Relationship Management

About the role

Original posting from Ambient.ai via Ashby

Build a safer world with us, one incident at a time.

Ambient.ai is the category creator and leader in Agentic Physical Security. Powered by Ambient Pulsar, the first reasoning Vision-Language Model purpose-built for physical security, our platform seamlessly integrates with existing security cameras and physical access control systems to unify monitoring, access control, threat assessment, response, and investigations through an always-on reasoning layer that augments security operators with superhuman capabilities. The results: 95% fewer false alarms, investigations 20x faster, and 10x faster response.

The momentum speaks for itself: we doubled new ARR in FY26, and have delivered results for world-class customers including Cisco, ServiceNow, SentinelOne, TikTok, Bayer, and MoMA. That kind of momentum creates an environment where great people thrive, and it shows: we recently ranked #71 out of 500 on the Forbes best startup employers list https://www.forbes.com/lists/americas-best-startup-employers/.

Founded in 2017 and backed by Andreessen Horowitz, Y Combinator, and Allegion Ventures, Ambient.ai is on a fast-paced journey to fulfill our mission: prevent every security incident possible.

Ready to learn more? Connect with us on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/ambient-ai/?viewAsMember=true and YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@ambient-ai-inc

THE ROLE

You'll lead the Ecosystems team: the engineers who connect Ambient.ai http://Ambient.ai to the Physical Access Control Systems (PACS) our customers run, and who are extending into new access control capabilities. You'll own both the team and the partner relationships behind it.

The team's work ranges from building and maintaining PACS integrations that customers depend on every day to developing new access control products from an early, ambiguous starting point. You'll set direction and priorities across all of it.

Every alarm Ambient Access Intelligence verifies depends on this team's integrations, so reliability is part of the job, alongside building what comes next.

This is a player-coach role. You'll manage and grow a small team, stay close enough to the code to make sound architecture calls, and represent Ambient.ai http://Ambient.ai credibly with partner engineering and product leaders. You'll report into EPD leadership.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

Lead the team

  • Hire, manage, and grow a team of backend and integration engineers, and set a high bar for ownership of production systems.
  • Split the team's capacity between integration delivery and new product development, and rebalance as priorities shift.
  • Stay hands-on: review designs, unblock hard debugging, and write code where it moves the team fastest.

Own delivery across both workstreams

  • Own the PACS integration roadmap with product: which partners to add, which capabilities to deepen, and what it takes to keep existing integrations reliable.
  • Set up the operating model for integrations in production: monitoring, on-call, partner escalation paths, and regression testing against partner releases.
  • Define the architecture and milestones for new access control capabilities, from device communication and credential management to the cloud services and APIs behind them.

Run partner relationships

  • Be the primary engineering contact for PACS and hardware partners, from technical scoping through joint roadmap planning.
  • Negotiate API access, SDK support, test hardware, and escalation commitments, and hold partners to them.
  • Represent Ambient.ai http://Ambient.ai in partner technical reviews and joint customer escalations, and bring what you learn back into our product strategy.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

  • Deep experience with access control systems, from the software side (a PACS vendor, a cloud access control company, or an integrator's engineering team) or the hardware side (locks, readers, controllers, credentials).
  • 6+ years in software engineering, including 2+ years managing engineers or leading a team as a tech lead with people responsibilities.
  • A track record of shipping and operating integrations with third-party systems, and of building something new from an early, ambiguous starting point.
  • Experience owning technical relationships with external partners: you've scoped joint work, negotiated access and support, and resolved escalations without losing the relationship.
  • Strong backend and distributed systems judgment, including systems that span customer-site hardware and the cloud.
  • Clear communication with engineers, product leaders, partner executives, and customers alike.

NICE TO HAVE

  • Direct experience with PACS, lock, or credential platforms such as LenelS2, C-CURE 9000, Genetec, Brivo, or similar.
  • Built or led a cloud-managed access control product end-to-end, including controllers, credentials, and mobile access.
  • Working knowledge of access control protocols and standards: OSDP, Wiegand, BLE and NFC mobile credentials.
  • IoT platform experience: device provisioning, fleet management, firmware updates, MQTT.
  • Familiarity with enterprise security buyers and the compliance expectations that come with them (SOC 2, audit trails, role-based access)

Why join us:

  • We are creating an entirely new category within a 180+ billion-dollar physical security industry and looking for team members who are also passionate about our mission to prevent every security incident possible
  • We partner with an incredible customer roster of F500 companies, including Adobe, TikTok, Gap and SentinelOne
  • Regular Full-time employees receive stock options for the opportunity to share ownership in the success of our company
  • Comprehensive health + welfare package (Medical, Dental, Vision, Life, EAP, Legal Services, 401k plan)
  • We offer flexible time off to rest and recharge, including Winter Break (time off between Christmas and New Year’s for most roles, depending on customer demand)
  • The latest tech and awesome swag will be delivered to your door
  • Enjoy a full range of opportunities to connect with your awesome co-workers
  • We love to hike https://www.alltrails.com/us/california/redwood-city, are foodies, and love music! Check out our most recent Ambient Spotify Playlist https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2kx8dM5h65Tac5UOo0kuWr?si=cebFZmkHQhKEvnoall2rcQ

We’ve found that in-person time meaningfully supports collaboration, creativity, and team alignment. Our talent, engineering, product, design, and marketing teams work from our Redwood City office three days a week. All other Bay Area employees join on Fridays to stay connected and close out the week together.

Ready to learn more? Connect with us onLinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/ambient-ai/?viewAsMember=true| YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@ambient2599

#LI-Hybrid

Ambient.ai is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer.  Ambient does not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or related medical conditions), gender identity, gender expression, national origin, ancestry citizenship, age, physical or mental disability, legally protected medical condition, family care status, military or veteran status, marital status, registered domestic partner status, sexual orientation, genetic information, or any other basis protected by local, state, or federal laws. Ambient is an E-Verify participant.

Source: Ambient.ai careers (Ashby)

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