Founding CFO / Chief Financial Officer
Equanimo.AI · United States
Tailor my CV for this job — freeFounding CFO / Chief Financial OfficerEquanimo.ai — AI Sovereignty PlatformFull-time · Founding Team · Meaningful Equity · Cambridge, MA (Hybrid)Help build the company that makes enterprise AI provableEvery regulated enterprise is adopting AI. Very few can prove they govern it. Equanimo.ai closes that gap — giving banks, healthcare organizations, and other regulated enterprises control over what their AI knows, what it shares, and who it answers to.Our product is live, we are SOC 2 certified, and we are working with early enterprise customers while converting an active pipeline of proofs of concept. We are now preparing for our institutional seed round.We are looking for a CFO who wants more than a seat at the table — someone who wants to help build the table. You will join the founding team, own a meaningful stake in the company, and build the financial strategy and investor narrative from institutional seed through scale.Your mandate: build the capital strategy, financial discipline, and finance organization required to take Equanimo from its first institutional round to an IPO-ready company.This is not a bookkeeping role, and it is not an advisory role. It is a founder's role.Why EquanimoEnterprise AI is moving from experimentation to accountable adoption. While many AI security products focus on prompt filtering or data redaction, Equanimo governs AI with organizational context and policy enforcement across the AI interaction lifecycle.Contextual governance: Equanimo understands who is asking, what they are entitled to know, the context of the interaction, and what AI should or should not reveal.Tacit Knowledge Control: We help protect expertise and institutional knowledge that can unintentionally leave an organization through AI interactions.Sovereignty by design: Enterprises retain control over their data, models, policies, and deployment choices — critical for regulated and security-conscious organizations.Enterprise-ready: The platform is live, Equanimo is SOC 2 certified, and we are engaging early enterprise customers and an active POC pipeline.Built by enterprise operators: Our founding team brings decades of experience building technology platforms across financial services, healthcare, and other complex enterprise environments.Why join nowFounder-level ownership: Your equity reflects founding-team responsibility and long-term value creation.Day-one influence: Report directly to the CEO, gain board visibility, and shape financing, pricing, hiring, GTM economics, and company strategy.Build from zero: You will create the finance function, operating model, controls, investor reporting, and capital strategy rather than inherit them.Institutional opportunity: Help translate differentiated technology, enterprise traction, and a major emerging market into an investor-grade growth story.What you will ownCapital strategy & fundraising — primary focusOwn the financial and execution side of fundraising with the CEO and founding team.Lead preparation and execution of the institutional seed round, followed by Series A and subsequent financings.Develop the financing strategy and build and manage the investor pipeline.Actively originate, cultivate, and convert relationships with VC, strategic, growth, and other institutional investors.Build investor materials, financial models, data rooms, diligence responses, and financing scenarios.Drive fundraising from initial investor engagement through diligence, negotiation, and closing.Work with counsel on term sheets, SAFEs, convertible instruments, priced rounds, governance rights, and capitalization strategy.Develop capital-allocation priorities and a financing roadmap tied to operating milestones.This is an execution role. You will be expected to help convert investor conversations into successful financings — not simply prepare financial materials.Financial strategy & planningBuild and own a dynamic 3–5 year operating model covering revenue, customers, headcount, infrastructure, expenses, cash, and financing requirements.Lead budgeting, forecasting, and scenario planning.Own cash forecasting, burn, runway, and capital efficiency.Model pricing, packaging, hiring, market expansion, and product-investment decisions.Create visibility into AI infrastructure costs, gross margin, and software-versus-services economics.Financial & investor storyCo-author investor decks covering market opportunity, business model, unit economics, capital requirements, and growth.Translate product, customer, and GTM milestones into investor-grade financial language.Build base, upside, and stress cases for financing and board discussions.Produce investor updates, board materials, KPI reporting, and financial dashboards.Establish consistent reporting for ARR, pipeline conversion, gross margin, burn, runway, CAC, retention, and other SaaS metrics.Operations & governanceBuild reporting, billing, collections, revenue recognition, controls, and compliance processes appropriate for a scaling SaaS company.Manage accountants, auditors, tax advisors, counsel, banking relationships, and financial providers.Maintain the cap table, equity records, option-pool planning, and capitalization scenarios.Coordinate 409A valuations, R&D tax credits, tax planning, and QSBS evaluation with qualified advisors.Build an audit-ready financial foundation and progressively strengthen governance as Equanimo scales.Long-term value creationBuild a finance organization capable of supporting institutional growth and eventual public-company-level financial discipline.Develop a roadmap toward audit-ready financials, scalable controls, board governance, and eventually SOX-ready processes.Maintain a long-term view of strategic alternatives, including public-market readiness, strategic transactions, and other liquidity opportunities.Help leadership understand the milestones and value-creation levers that increase strategic and financial optionality.What success looks like in the first 12 monthsInstitutional seed financing successfully closed, with you playing a leadership role from strategy and investor targeting through diligence and close.A credible 3–5 year operating model connecting product, GTM, hiring, infrastructure, runway, and capital requirements.Investor-grade reporting, KPI definitions, cap-table management, and diligence infrastructure.Clear visibility into ARR, pipeline conversion, gross margin, burn, runway, and AI infrastructure economics.Disciplined budgeting and capital allocation that protects runway while supporting growth.Consistent investor and board communication.A financing roadmap with measurable milestones toward the next institutional round.Who we are looking forWe want a hands-on technology startup operator who has lived the early-stage journey — not simply a corporate finance executive making a first move into startups.Several years of financial leadership within venture-backed technology startups, ideally seed through Series B.Experience as an early finance leader who helped build the function from the ground up.Demonstrated experience raising institutional capital and driving fundraising execution.Experience shaping financial narratives and investor materials that contributed to successful financings.Fluency in SaaS metrics including ARR, NRR, ARPU, ASP, CAC/LTV, burn multiple, retention, and gross margin.Ability to personally build models, analyze data, prepare board materials, manage diligence, and establish processes before a larger team exists.Comfortable with lean resources, fast decisions, changing priorities, and high personal accountability.Strong judgment about when to raise, what investors expect, and how to prepare the company.Demonstrated ability to build and convert investor relationships.Strongly preferredEnterprise software, cybersecurity, AI infrastructure, or technology-platform experience.Existing relationships with seed and Series A investors in enterprise software, cybersecurity, or AI.Experience with strategic partnerships, licensing, or complex enterprise commercial arrangements.Experience through acquisition, later-stage financing, or IPO readiness.MBA, CPA, investment banking, VC, PE, or relevant corporate-finance background.Prior founding-team experience or experience as a founder.Who thrives hereYou are a builder energized by ownership, speed, and ambiguity. You would rather shape a company than inherit one. You are comfortable building a model yourself, joining an investor call an hour later, and walking into a board discussion with command of both the numbers and strategy.You combine financial rigor with founder-level urgency. Early-stage finance is not simply about reporting what happened — it is about helping determine what the company should do next.Compensation & termsEquity: Meaningful founding-team equity, subject to board approval and definitive equity documentation. Expected three-year vesting with a one-year cliff and change-in-control treatment under the applicable equity agreement.Cash: Modest base salary during the pre-financing stage, stepping toward market compensation following successful institutional financing, with bonus eligibility and benefits as established by the company.Structure: Full-time executive role reporting directly to the CEO, with board visibility and participation in strategic and financing decisions.