'Wanted to work in...': Ex-Amazon employee says he prefers startup over big tech giant

Kanav Bhatnagar said he left Amazon for a smaller startup. (Image credit: Pexels)

• Kanav Bhatnagar left Amazon for startup roles in New York City
• He now works as a Forward Deployed Engineer at Rippling
• FDE role combines software engineering with business insights

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A 24-year-old software engineer from India has shared insights about his work in New York City. Kanav Bhatnagar, who works as a Forward Deployed Engineer at Rippling, an HR tech company, a role once described as the “hottest job in AI”.

Bhatnagar shared insights into his career and the skills required for an FDE in an essay for Business Insider.

Bhatnagar completed his schooling in Delhi before relocating to the United States for a degree in Mathematics and Computer Science with a minor in Applied Statistics from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

After graduating in 2022, he joined Amazon, where he worked for over two years on Fire TV Live TV software, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Writing for Business Insider, Bhatnagar explained that he quit Amazon to work at a smaller startup rather than at a company that employs about 1.5 million people worldwide.

“Amazon hired me as a software engineer out of college, and it was a big learning opportunity, teaching me the fundamentals of engineering,” he said. “But it was a behemoth of a company, and I eventually wanted to work in a smaller environment where I could take more personal ownership over product decisions and learn more on the job,” he added.

After nearly three years at Amazon, Bhatnagar interviewed at a sales startup called Actively AI, where he landed a role in forward-deployed engineering.

After close to three years at Amazon, Bhatnagar interviewed at Actively AI and secured a role in forward-deployed engineering.

“The FDE role was popularized by Palantir, and it has been described as the ‘hottest role in AI.’ I liked that it combined software engineering with understanding business,” he said.

Kanav Bhatnagar spent about six months at Actively AI before leaving to join Rippling as a senior FDE in October 2025.

“I've now been an FDE for roughly a year. Put simply, I'm a customer-facing engineer who tailors our product to each client. They describe their challenges and needs, and I build solutions and customisations,” he said.