iOS Developer

Full-Stack Engineer (iOS)

Los Gatos, CA | On-site 3–4 Days/Week | Full-Time | 5+ Years Experience

About the Opportunity

Shields Group Search is partnering with an innovative, venture-backed AI startup building the next generation of personalized photography experiences.

Our client is developing the first personalized AI photography coach, an intelligent camera that helps people take better photos of each other by suggesting poses and guiding users toward the perfect shot. Their mission is to help people feel seen through technology that makes capturing meaningful moments easier and more intuitive.

The iOS app is the core product, and the speed at which the team can ship, measure, and learn will directly determine how quickly the company grows.

Why Join?

• Exceptional founding team: Leadership brings experience from TikTok, Meta, etc. The CEO has scaled creator platforms and launched TikTok's Creator Marketplace, while the CTO is an accomplished AI researcher and former TikTok tech lead
• Real traction, with room to shape the future: Since launching in 2026, the company has surpassed 20,000 downloads and 190,000 AI-generated poses. The startup is backed by top Silicon Valley VCs
• No handoffs: You'll own the app and the systems behind it end to end. No waiting on contractors or navigating sign-off queues. An idea can be in TestFlight the same week.
• Huge impact: The team is building a next-generation camera and photography app powered by AI. If successful, your work will help define how people capture the moments they care about.

About the Role

We're seeking a strong Full-Stack Engineer with hands-on iOS experience to join our client's growing engineering team.

The iOS app is the product, so most of your work will focus on the mobile experience, along with the backend services that power it. You'll also ensure every release is properly measured, allowing the team to learn quickly what works and continuously improve the product.

Your mission is to help the company move faster: more shipping, more learning, and less friction between an idea and a result.

You don't need to be a career iOS specialist. With the rapid advancement of AI coding tools, the team values learning velocity, adaptability, and engineering effectiveness over years spent on any one platform.

You'll work closely with a Creative Technologist who owns the visual quality of AI-generated images and the generative pipelines behind them. You'll own the app and the systems that deliver those images to users.

What You'll Do

• Ship iOS features: Build and deploy features in Swift/SwiftUI, owning development end to end and helping shape the app's architecture, performance, and stability, including the camera experience at the heart of the product.
• Build backend services: Develop the APIs, services, and integrations with AI models required to support new product features.
• Instrument the app and run experiments: Implement event tracking, A/B tests, push notifications, and in-app messaging using existing tools and infrastructure. You won't need to build these systems from scratch.
• Work with AI agents as a team: Run multiple AI coding agents in parallel, critically review their output, and ship at a pace that looks like a team of five.
• Own product metrics: Analyze user behavior, identify drop-off points, and contribute data-backed ideas to product decisions.
• Contribute wherever needed: Support infrastructure, ML pipeline integrations, developer tooling, and TestFlight debugging. On a small team, everyone wears multiple hats.

Required Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional software engineering experience , with genuine full-stack capabilities, including building backend services and shipping user-facing products.
• Experience shipping at least one iOS application , professionally or through a side project. You don't need to be a career iOS specialist, but you should be comfortable with Swift, Xcode, and the App Store.
• Mastery of AI coding tools such as Claude Code, Codex, or Cursor. This means more than writing prompts. You should know how to run multiple agents across parallel tasks, provide effective context, and maintain high engineering standards. Be prepared to explain your workflow and setup.
• Strong product sense: You have opinions about what should be built, not just how to build it, and you're curious about the metrics that drive product success.
• Enthusiasm for photography: You don't need to be a professional photographer, but you should be excited by the idea of helping people capture better photos of one another.
• Local availability: You must live within commuting distance of Los Gatos, CA, and be available to work on-site 3–4 days per week.

Strongly Preferred

• Professional iOS engineering experience using Swift/SwiftUI on a production consumer application.

Bonus Qualifications

• Experience working with iOS camera or media pipelines, including AVFoundation, Core Image, or Metal.
• Experience running A/B tests or implementing product analytics.
• Experience shipping push notifications or lifecycle messaging.
• Background working on recommendation systems, computer vision, or generative AI products.
• Entrepreneurial experience, including founding a company or building a side project with real users.

Technology Stack

You'll work with:

• Mobile: Swift, SwiftUI, and the broader iOS ecosystem.
• Backend: Modern cloud infrastructure, APIs, and services.
• AI/ML: Generative image models deployed in production.
• Development workflow: AI-powered coding tools including Claude Code, Codex, and Cursor.

The company is iOS-first today , with plans to expand to Android and web in the future.

What the Team Values

• High ownership and a startup mindset: You approach the product as though it's your own. You've built meaningful side projects, worked at a startup, or are excited by the opportunity to do so.
• Mission-driven: You're passionate about photography and helping people feel seen.
• Collaborative: You give direct, thoughtful feedback and welcome it in return.
• Clear communication: You can explain technical tradeoffs simply and effectively, both in writing and in person.
• Can-do attitude: You're willing to tackle whatever the company needs, even when it falls outside your typical responsibilities.

Remote candidates will not be considered.

If you're a product-minded full-stack engineer with iOS experience, strong AI-assisted development capabilities, and a passion for building consumer products, we'd love to hear from you.