Mood-Mirrror - Technical Cofounder / Founding Engineer (Mobile + Backend + Data)

About MoodMirror
MoodMirror is building an emotion-aware video journaling app that helps people better understand themselves over time.
We’ve already built an MVP using on-device AI to detect and reflect emotional signals. Now we’re entering the next phase: transforming it into a product people love, return to, and grow with.
This means moving beyond a standalone mobile experience into a connected product - with user accounts, data history, trends, and meaningful feedback loops.
We’re early, scrappy, and thoughtful about what we build. No hype, just a real product solving a real problem.

The Role

• This is not a typical engineering role.
• You’ll be the technical cofounder / founding engineer, owning everything from mobile experience to backend infrastructure to how user data flows through the system.
• You’ll take an existing MVP and evolve it into a scalable, data-driven product, making pragmatic decisions about architecture, speed, and cost at every step.
• You’ll work closely with the CEO and Product Lead to shape both what we build and how we build it.

What You’ll Own

1. Product Evolution (MVP → Lovable Product)
   Turn an early prototype into a polished, reliable, engaging app
   Improve UX, performance, and overall product feel
   Work with the Product Lead to define what makes MoodMirror habit-forming and valuable

2. Mobile Development
   Lead development of the mobile app (iOS-first, but flexible)
   Decide whether to stay native or move to cross-platform
   Integrate existing on-device emotion AI into a seamless experience

3. Backend & Infrastructure (New)
   Design and implement a lean, cost-efficient backend
   Explore a potential move from edge-only storage to secure, scalable cloud storage
   Set up:
   * User accounts / auth
   * Data storage (metadata, emotional signals)
   * APIs for syncing and retrieval
   * Make smart tradeoffs (e.g. serverless, BaaS like Firebase/Supabase, etc.)

4. Data Pipeline (Critical)
   Build systems to capture, structure, and store user data cleanly
   Ensure data is:
   Accessible for analysis
   Well-structured for future models
   Privacy-conscious and secure
   Partner with Analytics to enable:
   Trend analysis
   Insight generation
   Future ML use cases

5. In-App Data Experience
   Turn raw data into simple, meaningful user feedback
   Build features like:
   Mood trends over time
   Streaks / patterns
   Lightweight visualisations
   Start simple, but design for future depth

6. Technical Leadership
   Set the technical direction and architecture
   Lay the foundation for a future team
   Potentially hire and lead engineers post-funding

What We’re Looking For
Core Capabilities
Strong experience building and shipping mobile apps (iOS or cross-platform; Swift, Kotlin, Java, Objective-C)
Experience with backend systems (APIs, databases, auth, cloud infra)
Ability to design end-to-end systems (app ↔ backend ↔ data)
Experience working with user data pipelines (capture → store → use)
Comfort working with early-stage, ambiguous environments

Bonus (but not required)
Experience with Firebase, Supabase, AWS Amplify, or similar
Exposure to ML / AI-powered products (especially on-device)
Experience building consumer products with retention loops
Basic understanding of data modelling for analytics

Mindset
Builder first: you ship, not just design
Pragmatic: you know how to get things done with near-zero budget
Product-oriented: you care about the user experience, not just code
Ownership mentality: you think like a founder, not an employee
Low ego, high standards

What Success Looks Like (First 3–6 Months)
MVP evolves into a stable, polished product
Backend is live with user accounts + synced data
Users can see basic trends from their history
Data is structured and usable for analytics
Tech foundation is solid but not overbuilt

Why This Role Is Interesting
You’ll own the full stack, not just a slice
Real product, real users, real problem space (mental wellness)
Massive design space at the intersection of:
Emotion AI
Personal data
Behaviour change
True cofounder upside if it works

How to Apply
Email with:
A short note on why this problem interests you
Brief thoughts on how you’d approach: “Turning a local-first AI app into a scalable, data-driven product on a near-zero budget”
Links to things you’ve built (especially 0→1 products)
CV
Confirmation you are OK with a cofounder equity-only package. Once funded we will look at paying a salary, but for now all cofounders work for equity-only.