(Senior) Design Engineer

Job description

Tacto builds AI-powered software for strategic procurement teams in manufacturing. Our product is evolving fast: we're introducing agentic capabilities that handle larger units of work autonomously - and come back to users when decisions are needed or results are ready. That shift demands a new kind of interface. Not just new screens, but new patterns for how humans and AI agents collaborate. And those patterns need to be built, not just designed. As a Design Engineer, you deeply understand a problem, then design, build, and ship a solution - often autonomously. You contribute directly to the codebase: building features end to end, crafting polished interactions, and ensuring that what ships feels as good as it works. You think like a designer and build like an engineer. You'll join a small design team and work embedded with engineering squads to ship product. WHY THIS ROLE MATTERS Engineering velocity at Tacto is high. Features move from idea to production fast - AI-assisted development is the default. That speed is a strength, but it creates a real challenge: the gap between what's designed and what's shipped keeps growing, interactions get neglected, and polish falls through the cracks. We need someone who closes that gap by being in the code. Not a design system caretaker, but a builder who ships features with high craft - and who naturally improves the shared foundations along the way. Someone who obsesses over the details that make a product feel great: the transitions, the keyboard interactions, the edge states, the moments of delight. YOUR IMPACT In this role, you will: - Design, build, and ship features autonomously - from understanding the problem, through design exploration, to production frontend code that users interact with. You own the result, not just a layer of it. - Craft polished interactions and experiences - you obsess over the details that make a product feel exceptional: transitions, micro-interactions, keyboard behavior, responsiveness, accessibility. - Prototype agentic interactions in real code - the flows where AI agents present results, request decisions, and show progress can't be mocked up in Figma. You build them so the team can see and feel them. - Raise the quality floor across the product - review PRs, jump into feature branches, and make sure shipped features feel right. As you build, you naturally strengthen the shared UI foundations and component library that the whole team relies on. - Bridge design and engineering - you work closely with designers on what's next, and with engineers on what ships. You skip the handoff: instead of waiting for specs, you shape the solution in Figma or code, whichever gets there faster. WHO YOU ARE We're looking for a block-shaped designer - not a T-shape with one deep skill, but someone genuinely strong across multiple disciplines. In your case, the block leans technical: you're an engineer who thinks like a designer, or a designer who builds like an engineer. Either way, you ship real code and care deeply about how it feels. You'll be a great fit if you: - Have strong frontend engineering skills - you write production-quality React/TypeScript and you're comfortable owning code that goes to customers. - Have a real design sensibility - you notice when spacing is off, when an interaction feels sluggish, when a flow doesn't communicate what it should. You don't need someone to hand you a pixel-perfect mock to build something good. - Prototype in code as your default mode. When exploring an idea, you'd rather spin up a working version than make a static mockup. - Care deeply about craft and polish - transitions, animations, keyboard behavior, cross-browser consistency, accessibility. The details behind the pretty pixels. - Use AI tools as core leverage in your daily work - Claude, Cursor, v0, ChatGPT, or whatever makes you faster. You organize your workflow around these tools and push what's possible. - Can work autonomously across the full scope - comfortable going from a rough problem to a shipped feature, making design decisions along the way. Bonus points if you: - Have worked on products where AI behavior needed to be surfaced clearly to non-technical users, - Have experience with motion design, micro-interactions, or advanced CSS/animation, - Have contributed to design systems or component libraries - not as a full-time job, but as a natural byproduct of building great product. OUR BACKGROUND Tacto is building the intelligence layer that connects AI to the physical world of manufacturing, starting with procurement. AI is transforming every industry, but it stops at the factory gate. The knowledge that holds manufacturing together - part costs, suppliers, materials - is scattered across systems and people. Over 50% of a product's cost originates from suppliers, making procurement the single largest cost lever in manufacturing and the missing connection between the digital and the physical world. Yet it still runs on Excel and legacy systems. We're changing that with our Procurement Intelligence Platform, trusted by hundreds of companies running billions of Euros of material. Based in Munich, we are 100+ passionate builders who are in-office, with high expectations, fast growth, and a lot of fun. We are supported by >€50m from Sequoia, Index, and Europe's leading tech entrepreneurs and industry veterans. WHY IT MATTERS Manufacturing forms Europe's economic backbone, driving a fourth of Europe's GDP and providing over 30% of jobs. These hidden champions and global market leaders manufacture the physical world around us, from the machines that build our cities to the medical devices that save lives. But the world is changing. The US dominates the digital world of bits. China is scaling the world of atoms, manufacturing at unprecedented speed and scale. Geopolitics are more uncertain than ever. Europe's strength lies in its deep industrial knowledge through generations of engineering. Manufacturing worldwide runs on European machines and software. But that heritage is only an advantage if we leverage it in the age of AI. Tacto builds the AI that connects Atoms and Bits, empowering our Industrial Base to Stay Stronger and building a lighthouse for European tech. WHAT WE OFFER The people at Tacto are passionate about building the organization, growing themselves, and our product while having fun and being real. We have high expectations, great talent density, and a culture where your ambition, performance, and agency are what count - not where you come from or how big your ego is. You'll grow at the forefront of AI, have real ownership and impact, and be surrounded by the best people in their field who challenge you and make you better every day. That is demanding and rewarding, but that's where we thrive. Besides that you have: - Money: Competitive salary & equity in the company with real upside, so you are invested in our success - Workplace: A vibrant in-office culture (> 4 days/week) in a beautiful office in central Munich - Development: A development budget and regular exposure to exceptional people, e.g., Lunch & Learns, peer mentoring, external speakers - Time off: 26 + 4 vacation days per year (4 fixed “company rest days”) as well as regular off-sites and team events - Health: Wellpass membership, of course, a fruit basket (!), and access to Jobrad, for your health - Family & Social Security: Voluntary pension contribution, voluntary KITA subsidy for your children Tacto is an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, or gender identity. Please do not submit personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, data concerning your health, or data concerning your sexual orientation.