Software Engineer, Payments Product Lead

Aptos is a high-performance Layer 1 designed for financial services: sub-second settlement at sub-cent cost, production reliability institutions build on, and native stablecoins including assets exclusive to the network. We are consolidating our commercial efforts into one financial services company — payments, tokenization, and trading — and payments is the first chartered business: a ring-fenced unit with its own P&L, an exclusive global settlement partnership already signed, first-party products already shipped (keyless onboarding, multisig treasury, confidential payments), and clear evidence gates at 90 days, 6 months, and 24 months.

This role is the founding technical leader of that unit. You are hire number one of the engineering team, and the build you lead defines the business.

• The Aptos Payment API. Spec, ship, and run the single API businesses integrate against — wrapping partner infrastructure today, with an orchestration engine routing across a licensed partner network as the business earns it. You write the spec bottoms-up from partner and client requirements.
• Partner-facing engineering. You are the technical face of the unit: requirements intake, integration leadership, and technical diligence with banks, EMIs, PSPs, stablecoin issuers, and e-wallet platforms. You can run those calls alone and write the requirements doc after.
• The trust infrastructure. Revenue attribution and reconciliation (the system that proves which volume is ours), a single-window KYC/KYB integration, a testnet sandbox that lets any prospect try the stack before compliance onboarding, and a native-asset-only settlement policy — no bridges.
• Integration with the trading stack. Our trading team builds the RFQ liquidity and tokenized-FX systems; you own the payments side of that seam — routing corridor FX through their venue, defining the API contract between the two systems, and making the handoff invisible to clients.
• The team and the calls. Hire and lead the first two engineers; grow the team only as revenue triggers fire. Make the build-vs-buy decisions (orchestration components, KYC tooling) with written memos at each gate.

• Publish the Payment API v1 spec and ship the testnet sandbox.
• Stand up revenue attribution v1 and harden USDT/USDC settlement rails to production grade.
• Ship the first client integration hands-on, end to end.
• Draft the orchestration build-vs-buy memo that frames the unit's biggest technical decision.

These are not aspirations — they are the unit's first gate, and the role's report card is the engineering column of the business's scorecard.

• 8+ years building payment infrastructure at production scale — PSP or orchestrator-class systems: cross-border rails, on/off-ramps, virtual accounts, reconciliation.
• Hands-on chain-native settlement experience: stablecoin rails, ramp integrations, wallet infrastructure. Move or Rust a plus; strong engineering judgment on any stack a must.
• Front-facing gravitas: banks, issuers, and regulated partners treat you as a peer. You've led external technical relationships, not just internal roadmaps.
• A product engineer's instincts: you build bottoms-up from what clients and partners actually need, and you treat existing internal products as assets to resell — not constraints to build around.
• Player-coach by default: you ship code, then hire people better than you at parts of it.

• APAC corridor experience — e-wallet ecosystems, QR rails, regional licensing landscapes.
• Enough FX and market-structure fluency to be a strong counterpart to the trading team on the RFQ integration.
• Working familiarity with payments regulation (money transmission, MiCA, Singapore PS Act) — enough to design with counsel, not practice law.
• A prior 0→1: founding engineer, first technical hire, or owner of a product line from blank page to revenue.

• Distribution is solved before you start. An exclusive settlement partnership routes committed volume to the network — you build against real flow, not hoped-for flow.
• The business is chartered. Written gates, a stop condition, and growth triggers tied to revenue — you'll always know exactly where the business stands and what your work must prove next.
• The scope compounds. What starts as one API becomes an orchestration network and a tokenized-currency framework, integrated with a trading venue's liquidity — the technical agenda grows with every gate the business clears.
• You define the org. Every engineering hire after you is your call, made against revenue evidence.