Edra
1 open Forward Deployed Engineer role at Edra. Curated with comp bands.
On the board since Aug 2026 · still hiring
Our take
Why Edra
The purest FDE-DNA startup on the board — the people who built Palantir's forward-deployed AI motion, now selling it as a product on a $30M Sequoia Series A.
- FDE type
- True forward-deployed
- Travel
- Medium
- Comp
- Equity-heavy
- Stage
- Early-stage
A good fit if you're…
- Ex-Palantir types who want the FDE playbook without the large-company bureaucracy
- London-based engineers who want founding-team equity and are fine in-office five days a week
- Engineers with real production-LLM experience who want to build agentic systems, not prototypes
- People who thrive owning a customer relationship end-to-end, from ambiguity to shipped workflow
First-generation FDE pedigree
Edra was founded by two Palantir veterans: Eugen Alpeza, who built major commercial accounts and helped launch Palantir's AI platform, and Yannis Karamanlakis, described as Palantir's first forward deployed AI engineer. The founders began the deployment motion inside Palantir's London office. If you want the FDE model from the people who wrote the playbook rather than a company imitating it, this is the shortest path to the source.
What the product actually does
Edra builds a context-learning platform: agents that ingest a company's knowledge bases, tickets, logs and chat histories, then execute real workflows with confidence scoring. The pitch is turning scattered operational data into a library of executable knowledge, with early focus on IT service management and customer support. Named early customers include HubSpot, ASOS and Cushman & Wakefield.
What 'forward deployed' means here
This is the archetype the rest of the board imitates: embed with an enterprise customer, own the full technical relationship, and ship bespoke solutions on top of the platform. Concretely you'd write production code, design agentic systems, build eval and confidence infrastructure, and feed reusable capabilities back into the core library — so each deployment improves the product, not just that one account.
London, in-office, five days
The Forward Deployed AI Engineer seat is in Holborn, central London, in-office five days a week — a deliberate signal of a high-intensity, co-located founding culture. (US press coverage describes Edra as New York-based; the FDE role is explicitly London.) If you want distributed or remote work, this is the wrong seat; if you want to be in the room while a founding team sets its culture, it's the right one.
Comp: base plus meaningful equity
The board lists comp as undisclosed base plus what Edra calls meaningful equity — read that as an equity-forward founding-seat offer, where the upside is in the cap table rather than the base. Expect a London-market base with early-stage stock as the real lever. On a $30M Series A this is a genuine early bet, not a late-stage package.
The bet you're making
You're betting on pedigree and stage: Sequoia led a $30M Series A (with 8VC and A*) in March 2026, and the founders carry the original Palantir FDE credential. The upside is being an early technical hire at a company built by the category's originators; the risk is the usual Series A one — small team, unproven at scale, and a five-day in-office commitment in London.
Questions candidates ask
Who founded Edra?
Two Palantir veterans — Eugen Alpeza, who built commercial accounts and helped launch Palantir's AI platform, and Yannis Karamanlakis, described as Palantir's first forward deployed AI engineer. They started the motion in Palantir's London office.
Where is the job based?
London — Holborn, in-office five days a week. US press coverage lists Edra as New York-based, but the Forward Deployed AI Engineer seat is explicitly London and co-located, so it's not a remote role.
What would I build?
You'd own enterprise engagements end-to-end for Edra's context-learning platform — agents over a customer's knowledge bases, tickets and logs — writing production code, designing agentic systems, building eval and confidence infrastructure, and feeding reusable capabilities back into the core library.
What's the comp like?
Undisclosed base plus what Edra calls meaningful equity — an equity-forward founding offer on a $30M Series A. Expect a London-market base with early-stage stock as the real upside, so weigh the cap table, not the salary.
Analysis updated 2026-09-28
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