Scale your engineering capacity.
Not your overhead.
We help VCs, Fintechs, and High-Growth Startups deploy senior engineering teams in days, not months. Zero compliance headaches.
Exzev is a B2B technical recruitment and executive search firm. We source, screen, and deliver senior engineers, technical leads, and C-level executives to companies that cannot afford a slow hire — from seed-stage teams shipping their first production system to enterprises rebuilding a platform team. Every search is run by recruiters who read code review comments, not just CVs.
Updated · Reviewed by the Exzev recruitment team
120+
Companies hired through Exzev
48h
To your first matched shortlist
2,847
Pre-vetted profiles across roles
31
Countries covered by the talent pool
The Cost of Vacancy
Every day a Senior Engineer role sits open costs your company ~$1,200 in lost productivity and delayed features. Over a three-month search that is a six-figure hole, and it is paid before anyone writes a line of code.
The Velocity Fix
We maintain a "Warm Bench" of pre-vetted senior talent. We can deploy a specialized engineer within 48 hours, because the screening happened before you had the vacancy — not after.
Global Arbitrage
Hire Top 1% talent from hubs like Poland, Brazil, and India. Get Silicon Valley quality code at 40-60% of the cost, with time-zone overlap chosen to fit your team rather than the other way around.
How hiring with Exzev works
Five steps from brief to signed offer. The whole process is designed around one constraint: your engineers should only ever spend time on candidates worth interviewing.
- 01
Intake call — 30 minutes
We map the role against your architecture, team structure, and stage: what the person will actually own in the first 90 days, which trade-offs they must be able to make alone, and which parts of the job description are negotiable. Most briefs change during this call, and that is the point — a role defined loosely produces a shortlist defined loosely.
- 02
Sourcing against a live pool
We do not start from zero. We maintain a warm bench of engineers and executives we have already spoken to, screened, and tracked across roles, and we extend it with targeted outbound for the specifics of your brief. That is why the first names reach you in hours rather than weeks.
- 03
Technical and motivational screening
Every candidate is screened by someone who understands the stack, not by a keyword filter. We check depth in the areas that matter for your brief, look for evidence of decisions made under real production constraints, and confirm compensation expectations, notice period, and genuine interest before anyone reaches your inbox.
- 04
Shortlist within 48 hours
You receive a small set of matched candidates — each with a written rationale for why they fit this brief, their salary expectation, availability, and the specific risk we see in them. No volume dumps: if we can only stand behind two candidates, we send two.
- 05
Interview support and close
We coordinate scheduling, collect structured feedback after every round, and stay in the loop through offer and start date. Placements come with a two-week risk-free trial, so a mis-hire costs you time rather than a full fee.
Ways to work with us
One search, a full team, or a leader for a quarter. The engagement is chosen on the intake call.
Permanent search
Full-time engineers, leads, and executives placed on a flat fee agreed before we start. No percentage-of-salary surprises, and no incentive on our side to push the most expensive candidate.
Executive and C-level search
CTO, CPO, CISO, CFO, and board-adjacent hires, run as a discreet process. Longer, more structured, and handled directly by the founding partners.
Interim and fractional leadership
A fractional CTO to audit a codebase before a raise, an interim COO to hold operations through a transition. Weeks, not quarters, and no permanent headcount commitment.
Team scaling and staff augmentation
Several engineers onboarded onto one team at once, sourced from hubs where senior talent costs 40–60% of Silicon Valley rates for equivalent seniority.
Roles we fill
Each role has its own page with market data, a compensation range, and the screening framework we use for it.
Engineering
AI & Data
Web3
Tailored for your stage
Specialized hiring tracks for demanding industries.
VCs & Portfolios
- Rapid Deployment: Fill critical gaps in portfolio companies post-raise.
- Fractional CTOs: Audit codebases and set architecture before Series A.
- Portfolio-wide terms: One agreement covering every company in the fund.
Fintech & Web3
- Niche Stacks: Rust, Solidity, Haskell, and Cobol experts on demand.
- Security First: Vetted for secure coding and ISO 27001 awareness.
- Regulated environments: Candidates who have shipped under audit and licence constraints.
Why we win
The evolution of hiring.
| Feature | Traditional Agency | EXZEV |
|---|---|---|
| Time to First Candidate | 2-3 Weeks | 24-48 Hours |
| Guarantee | None or 30 days | 2 Week Risk-Free Trial |
| Pricing model | % of candidate salary | Flat fee, agreed upfront |
| Technical screening | Keyword match on the CV | Screened by people who know the stack |
| Shortlist size | Volume — 15-30 CVs | Only candidates we stand behind |
| Cross-border hiring | Your problem | Contracts and compliance handled |
Where we operate
Headquartered in Dubai, UAE, with hubs covering European, LatAm, and Asia-Pacific talent markets. Candidates are sourced across 31 countries.
Headquarters
Dubai
UAE
Regional Office
London
United Kingdom
EU Operations
Tallinn
Estonia
LatAm Hub
São Paulo
Brazil
Asia Pacific Base
Bangkok
Thailand
Common questions
What companies ask before starting a search with us.
How fast will I see the first candidates?
Within 48 hours of the intake call for most engineering roles. Executive and C-level searches take longer to produce a first shortlist, because the pool is smaller and every approach is individual — we agree a realistic timeline with you at the start rather than promising 48 hours for every brief.
How does pricing work?
A flat fee, agreed in writing before the search starts, rather than a percentage of the candidate salary. That removes the incentive to inflate offers, and it means you know the cost of the hire before you see the first CV. Interim and fractional engagements are priced per engagement.
What happens if the hire does not work out?
Placements come with a two-week risk-free trial. If the person is not right within that window, you are not charged for the placement and we restart the search.
Where are your candidates based?
Across 31 countries. Exzev is headquartered in Dubai with hubs in London, Tallinn, São Paulo, Bangkok, and we source both locally and remotely. For distributed teams we prioritise overlap with your core working hours over raw cost.
Do you handle contracts, payroll, and compliance?
Yes. Cross-border hiring is where most in-house processes stall — entity requirements, contractor classification, and IP assignment differ by country. We structure the engagement so you are not creating a compliance problem in order to close an engineer.
Can you work alongside our internal recruiters?
That is the usual arrangement. Internal teams tend to be strong on pipeline and employer brand and thin on senior technical screening. We take the roles that are stuck, or the ones where the technical bar makes generalist sourcing inefficient.
How do you screen technically without our engineers in the room?
We screen for depth, not trivia: how the candidate has handled scale, failure, and trade-offs in production, checked against the specific constraints of your brief. It is a filter, not a replacement for your own interview loop — the goal is that every candidate you meet is worth the hour.
Which industries do you cover?
Strongest in fintech, Web3 and crypto, AI and machine learning, B2B SaaS, and cybersecurity, with active placements across healthtech, gamedev, e-commerce, and industrial. Sector matters most for compliance-heavy and regulated roles, where we filter for candidates who have already worked inside those constraints.
Stop interviewing. Start building.
Join the 120+ companies that have hired through EXZEV.