Hi, I recently got an offer for an ML role at a small (20-30 people) series A startup in LA - I am a masters' new grad from a top 5-10 engineering school and 2-3 previous internships at a few startups and 1 non big-N Palo Alto company. Base: 135k Signon: 15k Bonus: 10% Equity: 1,400,000 shares outstanding over 4 years (0.002%?) TC: ~145k in LA? The founders and company seem very smart and experienced (Stanford alumni, ex-FANG) but there doesn't seem to be as big of an established software team. I didn't really think too much of the equity as I figured it wouldn't be worth anything till IPO/Acquisition - would this be a solid opportunity to learn a great deal for my first job before applying to Bay Area positions in a few years? Where can I possibly push for more? I had asked for 155-165k base and 10k more signon - waiting to hear back. I have competing offers at Atlassian and another Bay Area startup for intern roles but I don't think they'll beat that base for full time.
This is a really great offer for LA. But keep in mind, it can take a long time to convert those paper money to cash.
It's a high startup new grad offer.
Do it. Startups are great to learn from early o. In your career. You can always step on to corporate. Only downside if the senior engineers are not experienced then you might pick a few bad habits of cutting corners to make it work, code testing etc.