Solution Engineer

Summary

Join Ably as a Solution Engineer and be at the forefront of the realtime digital revolution. You will work closely with engineering leaders, sales, product, and engineering teams to guide prospective customers through technical discovery and design powerful architectural solutions. This highly technical, hands-on role requires deep engineering acumen and customer intuition to influence product adoption and customer success. You will serve as a bridge between technical possibilities and business value, helping developers build faster and better on Ably's platform. Day-to-day responsibilities include guiding technical discovery and solution design, demonstrating Ably's capabilities through demos and proofs of concept, shaping the developer experience, solving real-world architectural challenges, enabling successful adoption, collaborating across functions, and creating and sharing technical content. This role offers a unique opportunity to contribute to the future of the internet and work with some of the most exciting and fastest-growing companies.

Requirements

• Proven experience in solution engineering or technical pre-sales, ideally in developer-first or infrastructure platforms
• A strong technical background in software engineering, with hands-on coding ability (JavaScript/TypeScript) and deep knowledge of modern APIs, backend services, web infrastructure and mobile development frameworks
• A working knowledge of event-driven systems, pub/sub messaging, and protocols like WebSockets, SSE, or MQTT
• An ability to translate complex customer architectures into elegant, scalable solutions powered by Ably
• Experience crafting tailored demos, prototypes, and PoCs that align with customer use cases and developer workflows
• An analytical mindset; you’re  able to assess systems and identify gaps or opportunities quickly and confidently
• Confidence and clarity in technical communication, with experience speaking to diverse technical stakeholders (from junior developers to CTOs)
• Empathy for developers. You’ve built things yourself and understand what a great developer experience looks like
• Comfort working in fast-paced, early-stage environments, where adaptability and ownership are key

Responsibilities

• Guide technical discovery and solution design. You’ll partner with our Sales team to drive pre-sales conversations, qualifying technical fit, uncovering architectural needs, and providing expert guidance on how Ably integrates into modern systems. In addition to hands-on collaboration with developers, you’ll often work directly with senior engineering leaders and decision-makers to shape strategic technical solutions
• Demonstrate Ably’s power in action. You’ll build and deliver impactful demos and proofs of concept that showcase Ably’s capabilities in a developer-centric, authentic, and engaging way
• Shape the developer experience. You’ll act as a strong advocate for developers; understanding their challenges and feedback, and championing improvements across the product and documentation to better serve our community
• Solve real-world architectural challenges. You’ll advise customers on topics such as distributed systems, event-driven architectures, realtime messaging protocols, cloud-native integration, and scalable infrastructure
• Enable successful adoption. You’ll take a hands-on role in early-stage solution design and ensuring customers are set up for long-term success with best practices and clear implementation guidance
• Collaborate across functions. You’ll work closely with technical and commercial teams across the business to relay insights from the field, influence roadmap decisions, and continuously improve how we engage with developers
• Create and share technical content. You’ll build internal and external artifacts to scale your impact; from custom demos and integration patterns to reusable tools, guides, and reference architectures

Preferred Qualifications

• Prior experience supporting API-first, infrastructure, or realtime messaging products
• Familiarity with cloud-native technologies, serverless platforms, and modern CI/CD practices
• Experience working with Sales teams using MEDDICC methodology
• A strong online technical presence such as GitHub projects, blog posts, or contributions to open-source tools
• A product mindset. You don't just solve the immediate problem; you think in terms of reusability, scale, and system design

Benefits

• A remote-first and flexible work environment. UK-based teams come together in person once per month in our London hub (next to Old Street) and we get together as a company twice per year. Aside from that, you’re welcome to work wherever suits best for you
• Equity. We’re a growing start-up and we want all team to members to share in the success of the company through our EMI share options programme
• Enhanced holiday allowance. Our policy provides Ablyans with 28 days of paid annual leave (27 regular days, plus a day off to enjoy your birthday)
• Enhanced parental leave package, so that you can take the time you need to get to know your new family member, rest and recover
• Home workstation budget of £500 on joining (and £150 p/a thereafter), so that your home office is set up to serve you well and that you have everything you need to work comfortably
• Personal learning and development budget of £1000 annually, and 5% L&D time during working hours to focus on improving your skillset
• Private healthcare with BUPA
• Medical cash plan to cover a range medical and dental costs
• Mental wellbeing coaching and counselling from Self Space
• Monthly wellbeing budget via Juno
• Life assurance and income protection
• Access to Tech & Cycle to Work schemes
• Weekly snack allowance for our end-of-week “Need To Know” meeting
• A fully-paid one-month sabbatical after five years with Ably