Joyride Labs

Founding Protocol Engineer

Joyride Labs

4 days ago

## About Joyride Joyride is building the first dedicated 0DTE options exchange for crypto traders. Derivatives are the single largest opportunity to bring traditional finance on-chain, with over $3.5 trillion in notional volume traded in the U.S. every day. Our architecture is hybrid: a central limit order book (CLOB) for low-latency execution, paired with a blockchain for transparent, non-custodial settlement. ### The Team You'll join a founding team that includes the founders and early contributors of Origin Protocol, where we've been building on Ethereum since 2017 and have scaled products to nine-figure TVL. Two of Joyride's cofounders are early advisors to Solana and have built multiple venture-backed companies acquired by Google, Yahoo, and Walmart. ### The Challenge Centralized exchanges are fast but require trust. On-chain exchanges are trustless but slow. We refuse to accept this tradeoff. Joyride centralizes execution for speed and decentralizes verification for trust. Making that seam airtight is the hard part. * **Self-Custody Without Compromise**: Users keep the keys to their own funds and can withdraw without permission from the exchange operator, even if our servers go down. This can't come at the cost of execution speed or capital efficiency. * **Verifiable Execution**: Every off-chain trade must be provably valid on-chain. The exchange operator cannot front-run, reorder, or fabricate trades. Cryptographic proofs link the off-chain matching engine to on-chain settlement without trusting the operator. * **Censorship Resistance**: If the exchange goes dark, users must be able to reconstruct their account state from public data and withdraw their funds. No capital can ever be trapped. * **Security**: DeFi protocols have lost billions of dollars to smart contract exploits, oracle manipulation, and bridge failures. Our on-chain systems must be designed defensively from day one. As our **Founding Protocol Engineer**, you will own the trust and verification layer of Joyride's hybrid architecture. You'll work alongside our Founding Principal Engineer, who owns the matching engine and risk engine. Together, you will build an options exchange that combines the speed of a CEX with the safety guarantees of a DEX. *If you've spent time thinking about how to make off-chain execution verifiable on-chain and how to protect users from a malicious operator, keep reading.* ### Problems You'll Work On * How do you prove to a Solana program that 50,000 off-chain trades were executed fairly, without exceeding compute unit limits? * What Merkle tree structure lets users prove their balance against an on-chain state root while keeping proof sizes small enough for a single transaction? * How do you build a forced withdrawal mechanism that works even when the exchange operator is adversarial or offline? * How do you batch-publish trade history to a DA layer without leaking information that front-runners can exploit? ### Your Domain * **Settlement & Custody**: Users keep custody of their own funds while trading on Joyride. The exchange can lock collateral for risk management but can never take it. When trades settle, funds move based on cryptographic proof, not operator permission. * **Verifiable Execution**: Our matching engine runs off-chain for speed. That means traders are trusting us not to cheat. Your job is to eliminate that trust requirement. Prove to the blockchain that every trade was executed fairly and that the operator can't front-run or manipulate the order book. * **Censorship-Resistant Recovery**: If Joyride disappears tomorrow, every user must be able to independently prove what they own and withdraw it. Trade history must be publicly available and verifiable without our cooperation. * **Unilateral Exit**: Users must be able to leave the system on their own terms, even if the exchange operator is malicious or offline. This is the ultimate safety guarantee and the hardest problem to get right. * **On-Chain Security**: The on-chain systems hold real money. You're the first line of defense, threat-modeling the boundary between off-chain and on-chain and designing systems that are resilient by construction, not by audit. ### Who You Are * **Protocol Engineer, Not App Developer**: You've worked at the infrastructure layer of blockchains: client implementations, consensus protocols, p2p networking, or cryptographic systems. You understand how chains work under the hood, not just how to deploy contracts on them. * **Applied Cryptographer**: You think in Merkle trees, digital signatures, and commitment schemes. You can evaluate whether a ZK proof system, a TEE-based attestation, or a simpler signature scheme is the right tool for a given trust boundary. You follow the research but you ship production code. * **Hybrid Architecture Thinker**: You understand how other exchanges connect off-chain execution with on-chain settlement. You have opinions about their tradeoffs and can articulate what you'd do differently. * **Security-Minded**: You think like an attacker. When you see a bridge between an off-chain server and an on-chain program, your first instinct is to enumerate the ways it can be broken. * **Builder**: You write code every day. You're not looking to manage a team. You want to architect and build critical infrastructure yourself. ### Requirements * 5+ years of systems engineering in Rust, C++, or Go * Deep experience with Solana program development or equivalent blockchain runtime * Strong applied cryptography: Merkle trees, digital signatures, hash-based commitments, proof systems * Understanding of DeFi security: common exploit vectors, smart contract auditing patterns * Experience with hybrid or L2 architectures: off-chain execution with on-chain verification/settlement ### Bonus * Built or worked on a hybrid exchange where matching happens off-chain and settlement happens on-chain * Worked on state verification, fraud proofs, validity proofs, or forced exit mechanisms for an L2 or rollup, including DA integrations * Contributed to a blockchain client or protocol implementation ### What We Offer * Competitive salary and meaningful equity * Remote-first * Full autonomy over your domain * Open-source friendly When applying, mention the word **CANDYSHOP** to show you read the job post completely.

Head of Growth

Joyride Labs

49 days ago

**Joyride** is building the first dedicated 0DTE options exchange to provide better leverage for crypto traders. Derivatives present the single largest opportunity to bring traditional finance on-chain with over $3.5 trillion dollars of notional volume traded in the U.S. every day. We are developing the fastest, most exciting exchange in history and looking for a **Head of Growth** who knows how to bootstrap a community from 0 to 1 (million users). ## The Team You will be joining a founding team with a proven track record of building successful companies on-chain and off. Joyride’s team includes the founders and early contributors of Origin Protocol, where we’ve been building on Ethereum since 2017 and have scaled products to nine-figure TVL. In addition to being early advisors to Solana, two of Joyride’s cofounders have built and worked multiple venture-backed companies that have been acquired by Google, Yahoo, and Walmart. ## The Challenge 0DTE options have taken Wall Street by storm: retail traders alone generate $1 TRILLION per day of notional volume. But they haven’t yet reached escape velocity in crypto. We’re here to change that. As our first non-engineering hire, your mandate will be to orchestrate a movement. You will work directly with the founders to define the Joyride brand—a mix of high-finance precision and WallStreetBets chaos. You will own the funnel from the first content post to the first deposit. ## What you will do: * **Narrative Warfare:** Own the story across X, TikTok, Reddit, and Discord, positioning Joyride not just as a product, but as the only venue for serious on-chain leverage. * **The Degen Loop:** Design and execute referral programs, trading competitions, and leaderboard mechanics that incentivize viral sharing of P&L. * **KOL & Influencer Strategy:** You know who moves markets in Crypto and TradFi. You will build relationships with key opinion leaders, not by paying them for shills, but by getting them addicted to our product. * **Data-Driven Hype:** Monitor on-chain analytics and community sentiment. You understand that volume is our north star metric. * **Launch Orchestration:** Plan and execute the genesis launch event. Manage the waitlist mechanic to create scarcity and FOMO. ## Who you are: * **Terminally Online:** You know the memes before they land. You understand the culture of WallStreetBets, Crypto Twitter, and blockchain ecosystems. * **Growth Hacker:** You’ve grown a Discord server to 50k+ or a Twitter account to 100k+ and you understand viral loops. * **Scrappy:** You are willing to grind and do what it takes to generate results without a big company budget. ## Requirements: * Proven track record in Web3 marketing or high-growth fintech * Deep understanding of various blockchain ecosystems * Ability to work in a chaotic, fast-paced environment * Connections to trading communities and experience in the trenches * Familiarity with AI content generation ## Bonus: * Knowledge of 0DTE and options concepts * A following and positive reputation in the WallStreetBets community * Experience with Veo 3 or equivalent AI content generation ## What we offer: * Competitive salary and upside * Remote work flexibility * Autonomy to solve challenging problems * Fast-paced environment * Unlimited growth potential * A platform for personal growth When applying, mention the word **CANDYSHOP** to show you read the job post completely.

Founding Principal Engineer

Joyride Labs

49 days ago

## Founding Principal Engineer Joyride is building the first dedicated 0DTE options exchange to provide better leverage for crypto traders. Derivatives present the single largest opportunity to bring traditional finance on-chain with over $3.5 trillion dollars of notional volume traded in the U.S. every day. We are developing a world-class exchange using a hybrid architecture: a central limit order book (CLOB) for low latency execution coupled with a blockchain for transparent, non-custodial settlement. ### The Team You will be joining a founding team with a proven track record of building successful companies on-chain and off. Joyride’s team includes the founders and early contributors of Origin Protocol, where we’ve been building on Ethereum since 2017 and have scaled products to nine-figure TVL. In addition to being early advisors to Solana, two of Joyride’s cofounders have built and worked for multiple venture-backed companies that have been acquired by Google, Yahoo, and Walmart. ### The Challenge 0DTE options have massive “Gamma risk”—prices move violently as expiration approaches. This presents a unique challenge for an exchange to operate safely. - **Balancing Solvency & Capital Efficiency**: Our portfolio margin engine must ensure that traders can always meet the obligations to their counterparties while minimizing the amount of collateral they’re required to post. - **Execution Speed**: To efficiently provide liquidity and avoid toxic flow, market makers need to update orders in milliseconds. Even the fastest blockchains today are too slow. - **Trust & Verifiability**: Traders demand self-custody and transparency. They won’t deposit funds into a black box they don’t control. - **Availability**: Global capital markets never sleep. Our exchange must be dependable and reliable, enabling traders to execute orders and withdrawals 24/7. As our Founding Principal Engineer, your mandate will be to solve this difficult challenge. You will architect a hybrid exchange engine that matches orders off-chain at the speed of light but settles them on-chain with cryptographic proof of validity. ### What You Will Build - **The Trusted Matching Engine**: Architect a high-frequency Central Limit Order Book (CLOB). It must handle massive throughput without the latency drag of a blockchain while maintaining verifiability. - **The Trust Bridge**: Design the cryptographic system that proves to the blockchain that the off-chain match was valid. We must ensure that the exchange operators cannot front-run or alter the order book. - **Atomic Settlement**: Write the programs that handle the movement of collateral based on the proofs generated by your off-chain engine. - **Risk & Liquidation**: Build a real-time risk engine capable of liquidating 0DTE positions instantly to protect the protocol from bad debt, even during high network congestion. ### Who You Are - **High-Performance Systems Expert**: You understand exactly how your code maps to hardware. You prioritize memory layouts, lock-free data structures, and concurrency patterns to squeeze every cycle out of the CPU. - **Architectural Polymath**: You are comfortable traversing the gap between high-performance cloud infrastructure and trustless state machines. - **Security Minded**: You think like an adversary. When you see a “hybrid” architecture, your first thought is “How do I break the link between the server and the chain?” ### Requirements - 5+ years of backend systems engineering (Rust, C++, or Go) - Deep proficiency with Rust - Familiarity with Solana and EVM development - Knowledge of event-driven architectures and asynchronous programming - Experience designing hybrid architecture - Strong grasp of applied cryptography ### Bonus - Experience building trading systems (matching engines, risk management) - Background in high-frequency trading or financial engineering - Previous work on a centralized exchange or CLOB DEX ### What We Offer - Competitive salary and upside - Remote work flexibility - Autonomy to solve challenging problems - Fast-paced environment - Unlimited growth potential - Support for open-source contributions When applying, mention the word **CANDYSHOP** to show you read the job post completely.