Solutions Architect - Pre-Sales

EMPLOYER IS A CONTRACTOR FOR THE U.S. GOVERNMENT. THIS POSITION REQUIRES U.S. CITIZENSHIP.Role Description: As a Solutions Architect at Defense Unicorns, you'll serve as the primary technical point of contact during customer engagements, working closely with business development, engineering, and product teams to ensure that our offerings are both compelling and relevant to our government and defense customers.This role combines deep technical knowledge with strong communication and problem-solving skills. You’ll be responsible for delivering live product demos, maintaining infrastructure for proof-of-concept environments, and supporting the long and complex sales cycles typical in the defense sector. Your mission is to ensure that prospective customers not only understand what our technology does, but believe in what it can do for them.This is a hands-on, customer-facing role ideal for someone who thrives in fast-paced, evolving environments and is passionate about making a tangible impact on national security through technology.Responsibilities: Act as a trusted advisor for customers and their technical needs, challenges, and goals during pre-sales engagementsParticipate in sales calls and business development meetings, often as the primary technical contact; travel as required to support on-site engagementsDiscover real mission needs beyond surface-level requirements; ask probing questions to understand the core mission challenges and align our solutions accordinglyArchitect solutions based on potential customer requirements and articulate those solutionsMaintain technical demo environments and lead live, hands-on demonstrations of our UDS Core platform and capabilitiesBuild and deliver technical proof-of-concepts, including live installations and technical walkthroughs to validate platform capabilities in real timeSupport the long defense sales process by staying engaged by delivering small proof-of-concepts, follow-up demos, and ongoing pre-sales technical supportThe listed responsibilities are not exhaustive and additional responsibilities may be assigned based on the evolving needs of the organization. We are seeking a dynamic individual who is able to adapt and take on new responsibilities as they arise. Preferred Experience and Qualifications:Strong understanding of Kubernetes, cloud infrastructure (AWS, Azure), and automation tools (Terraform, OpenTofu, etc.)Ability to clearly explain complex systems to a variety of audiences, from deeply technical engineers to non-technical stakeholdersComfortable doing live deployments, troubleshooting in real time, and adjusting depth on the fly depending on the room’s technical backgroundAble to read the room, admit mistakes, pivot as needed, and keep demos engaging and informativeCollaborative by nature to play well with cross-functional teams and prepare with your sales counterparts to tailor your approach for every engagementProactive and self-directed in building and maintaining infrastructure, finding answers, and pushing opportunities forward even when it gets hardPassionate about the national security mission and motivated by the opportunity to make a real impact, solving real problems for people in mission-critical rolesFull compensation packages are based on candidate experience. Compensation ranges are established using national benchmarking data and apply across all geographic locations within the United States. Remote - USA$148,750—$201,250 USDWho We AreDefense Unicorns delivers mission value by streamlining software delivery so our customers can focus on the most important challenges. We share a vision of freedom and security for the advancement of progress and innovation. Our commitment to this vision, and to our mission-driven customers, means a commitment to speed, user experience and optionality, without compromising security. Our team is composed of innovators, software engineers, and veterans with decades of experience delivering technology programs across the federal market.What We DoWe create and deliver secure solutions for continuous software integration and delivery. Defense Unicorns consolidates the best practices for security pipelines, testing, and deployment automation in order to meet the high security requirements valued by mission owners. Our solutions are agnostic by design and we believe that growing a robust ecosystem of secure, cloud-native software solutions can help enterprise customers inside and outside the federal market buy and integrate software more easily.Who We ServeDefense Unicorns’ customers are mission-focused leaders across public and private enterprises. We proudly support defense and civil agencies across the U.S. government and we work closely with the creators of leading-edge software solutions to deliver value to the mission-owner by improving the security and consumability of commercial software products.What We Work OnKubernetesCloud Environments (AWS/GCP and Azure)Infrastructure-as-code (like Terraform/P