Edge AI Application Engineer - Voice Reconstruction AI

About Whispp

Whispp is an award-winning deep-tech startup headquartered in Leiden, building our real-time on-device Voice Reconstruction AI that converts whispered, affected, and noisy speech into a person's clear, natural voice — all in under 100 ms, on-device, with full speaker identity preservation. The technology is commercialized through SDK licensing to smartphone OEMs, PC OEMs, chipset vendors, and hearing-protection manufacturers. Whispp has active proof-of-concept programs with tier 1 OEMs, and is on a trajectory toward its first integrations.

The role

As Edge AI Application Engineer you are the technical bridge between Whispp's core AI platform and the OEM partners who embed it into their products. You own the hands-on work of getting Whispp's SDKs running on customer hardware, through the full arc from initial scoping and prototype to validated PoC, signed NRE, and production-ready integration.

This is a build-and-ship role at a small, fast-moving team. You will work side-by-side with Whispp's AI researchers, the full-stack engineer, the Technical Product Manager, and the business development team. You will be the first dedicated integration hire and you will set the technical foundations that make it possible for Whispp to scale across multiple OEM programs simultaneously.

What you will do

SDK integration and customer delivery

- Integrate and validate Whispp's W2S SDK on customer reference devices, chipsets, and OS environments across Qualcomm Snapdragon, PC NPUs, and emerging hearable platforms.

- Own the technical execution of PoC and NRE programs, including hardware setup, integration milestones, KPI measurement, demo preparation, and final product-scope documentation.

- Develop and maintain integration documentation from v0.7 through v1.0, iterating based on customer feedback and SDK releases.

- Identify and resolve integration blockers, hardware-specific issues, OS audio pipeline incompatibilities, and latency or performance gaps early in each program.

- Set up and manage demo hardware configurations for PC and mobile, supporting sales presentations, trade shows, and customer meetings.

Technical customer engagement

- Serve as the primary technical contact for OEM integration teams during active PoC, NRE, and product validation phases.

- Translate customer-specific technical requirements — microphone configurations, NPU constraints, audio pipeline architecture, OS audio processing — into actionable integration scopes.

- Document integration approaches, milestones, timelines, and role responsibilities for each customer program.

- Support the sales team with technical depth during scoping calls, product validation meetings, and proposal preparation.

Platform and tooling

- Contribute to improving SDK robustness, embedded performance, and on-device AI execution across CPU and NPU targets.

- Support the licensing server integration and SDK activation flow as these mature from MVP toward v1.0.

- Help build repeatable integration playbooks, test harnesses, and hardware setups that reduce time-to-integration for each new OEM.

- Work closely with AI researchers to surface real-world integration feedback — noise conditions, device microphone behavior, latency measurements, personalization edge cases — that feeds back into model and SDK improvement.

Documentation and processes

- Maintain up-to-date integration documentation, scoping templates, customer success cases, and technical architecture overviews.

- Contribute to the Sales Kit, including architecture overviews, integration-approach documents, and benchmark/proof materials.

What we are looking for

Must-have

- 6+ years of hands-on experience in embedded software, mobile platform engineering, SDK integration, or systems engineering on Android and/or Windows.

- Strong C/C++ and Java/Kotlin skills for embedded or mobile platform work; Python is a plus for tooling and benchmarking.

- Experience with security enclaves and TEEs on x86 and ARM platforms

- Experience integrating third-party AI, AOSP, audio, or DSP libraries into OEM or mobile/PC products.

- Solid understanding of Android audio pipelines (AudioReach, AudioRecord, AudioTrack, AAudio, Oboe) or Windows audio frameworks (WASAPI, Windows Audio Session).

- Familiarity with NPU/DSP acceleration, TFLite, ONNX Runtime, or similar mobile inference frameworks.

- Proven ability to work directly with customer engineering teams, manage technical expectations, and document integration outcomes clearly.

- Strong written and verbal communication in English; Dutch is a bonus.

- Willingness to travel to customer locations roughly 30% of the time to support our forward-deployment model.

Nice-to-have

- Experience with speech processing, voice AI, DSP, or audio enhancement technologies.

- Background working with chipset vendors such as Qualcomm Snapdragon, MediaTek, or ARM platforms.

- Familiarity with on-device AI model optimization, quantization, or latency profiling.

- Experience with hearable, wearable, or hearing-protection device integration.

- Understanding of on-device biometric data handling, GDPR implications, or secure enclave/encrypted storage.

- Exposure to proof-of-concept or NRE-based commercial programs with OEM partners.

What success looks like in year one

- Whispp's Android SDK is successfully integrated and validated on at least one Smartphone OEM device through PoC to NRE.

- Integration documentation reaches v1.0 quality, enabling faster onboarding for future OEM programs.

- Demo hardware is consistently reliable and ready for Samsung, Qualcomm, and other major customer meetings.

- A second OEM integration program is underway with clear technical milestones and no blocking issues.

- Internal integration playbooks and templates are in place to support additional Application Engineer hires planned for later in 2026.

If this sounds like you, please send your CV and motivation to [email protected].

Whispp is committed to building a team that reflects the diversity of the people its technology serves. We encourage applications from all backgrounds.