The posting
ABOUT SPHERE
Every breakthrough in trade infrastructure has followed the same pattern: reduce a transaction cost, expand the market. Containerization for goods. SWIFT for money. Stripe for payments. Compliance is one of the last and largest — and the hardest, because trade rules aren't data to be looked up. They're a complex adaptive system with 190+ sovereign jurisdictions, in different languages, changing constantly, reacting to each other.
Sphere built the system that solves it. Our AI (TRAM) ingests global trade law, interprets it, resolves conflicts across jurisdictions, and produces compliance determinations more reliable than human experts. We handle the entire lifecycle — calculation, registration, filing, remittance — at millisecond latency with zero downtime.
- Backed by a16z and YC. $21M Series A, 30%+ month-over-month growth, customers include ElevenLabs, Replit, Deel, Runway, and Lovable.
- Small team, global surface area. Everyone owns a domain that would be a full team at a larger company. San Francisco, five days in office.
- The problem keeps compounding. Expanding into input tax, withholding, e-invoicing, tariffs — each multiplies the complexity. Tens of millions of transactions today, billions ahead.
THE ROLE
We're looking for an International Indirect Tax Compliance Specialist to help execute and scale our international tax compliance operations. Working closely with the Compliance Lead and Tax leadership, you'll own the day-to-day filing process for a portfolio of countries and customers, ensuring returns are prepared, reviewed, and submitted accurately and on time.
That covers a wide range of obligations, and the list keeps growing:
- Domestic VAT and GST returns, including annual returns where required (for example Germany, Italy and Spain)
- Non-resident and simplified regimes: EU OSS and IOSS, UK, Switzerland, Norway VOEC, India OIDAR, Japan JCT, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand
- EC Sales Lists
- SAF-T and similar data filings (for example Poland JPK, Portugal and Romania D406)
This role focuses on VAT, GST and similar taxes outside the US. US sales tax is handled by a separate team.
Beyond executing filings, you'll play a key role in improving how we operate and expand globally. You'll partner with Engineering to automate manual workflows, identify opportunities to streamline processes, and help build a more scalable, technology-driven tax compliance function. This role is ideal for someone who enjoys combining operational excellence with process improvement and is excited to help modernize tax operations.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
Within days
Work directly with our compliance lead and tax leadership on the below:
- Prepare, review, and file VAT/GST returns accurately and on schedule across multiple countries and filing frequencies
- Monitor filing status and operational metrics, proactively identifying risks and driving issues to resolution
- Perform reconciliations between tax returns, payments, and remittance records, investigating and resolving discrepancies
- Manage filing calendars, deadlines, and dependencies to consistently meet compliance obligations
Within months
- Own a portfolio of countries end to end, and build a filing playbook for each one
- Work with fiscal representatives, local agents and external reviewers, and manage tax portal access and digital certificates (for example Elster, AEAT and HMRC MTD)
- Execute process and automation improvements in collaboration with the broader Tax team and Engineering
- Flag process gaps, errors, and risk areas
- Take on a growing share of filing volume as the business scales
- Work with the Customer Success team to build a knowledge base and trainings to address customer questions
REQUIREMENTS
- 3+ years of experience preparing, reviewing, and filing high volumes of VAT/GST returns across multiple countries, ideally at a Big 4 firm or an outsourced VAT compliance provider covering 10+ countries
- Working knowledge of VAT rules for cross-border trade: place of supply for digital and electronically supplied services, B2B vs B2C treatment, reverse charge, OSS mechanics and VAT number validation
- Solid understanding of return filing processes, reconciliations, and controls
- Hands-on experience with tax authority portals and country-specific filing formats
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, with experience collaborating across Finance, Operations, and Engineering teams - we work at an extremely fast pace and so clear, concise communication is essential
- High attention to detail - one of our key values is ‘Sweating the details’ and it is essential in our business
- Multitasking capabilities - a lot will be thrown at you and you’ll need to manage your time wisely
- Eagerness to lean in and learn new countries, regimes and processes quickly. Our coverage grows every month, and you'll often be the first person at Sphere to file in a new country or work through a new obligation
NICE TO HAVES
- Experience working with tax automation or compliance platforms
- Familiarity with AI, web automation, and data analytics tools
- Comfortable partnering with software engineering or product teams to automate operational workflows
- Language skills, in addition to English
WHO YOU ARE
You'll thrive here if:
- You're a Dog. You've been underestimated, gone through struggle, and never stopped running. You have a chip on your shoulder and enormous drive. You look at Stripe, Deel, and Flexport all punting on compliance and think: good, that means the opportunity is ours. Hunger beats pedigree.
- Early stage is in your bones. You've built things where there's no playbook and nobody handing you the answer. You define the problem instead of waiting for instructions.
- You own it end to end. Give you a goal and you figure out your own path. Small team, global surface area — everyone owns a domain that would be a full team at a larger company. No one tells you how.
- You believe speed and accuracy are both possible. We're building a complex product that requires robustness and 100% uptime, and we have to build at our customers' pace. Move fast. Don't break things. Both.
This won't be a fit if:
- You need structure handed to you or ambiguity feels draining rather than motivating
- You want to manage people more than own hard problems (we're a flat, experienced team — everyone builds)
- You're used to "good enough" shipping (small errors have outsized impact here)
