Everything you need to run the Melotech interview cold — your pitch, the questions they'll throw, the stack, what to ask back, where to land on money, and the two rehearsal audios. Drill it until the meter fills.
4,300★
ace-step-ui · 650 forks
15–20k
active users on Pinokio
610★
HeartMuLa Studio
1M
InstantArt users / 2 months
#3
App Store · above Shazam
Mastery
0 / 22warming up
Your positioning — say it in your sleep
Lead with numbers, never with need. This is the spine of every answer.
ace-step-ui is at 4,300 stars and 650 forks — the go-to open-source interface for local AI music generation, with 15–20k active users on Pinokio. HeartMuLa Studio is at 610. Both built and shipped solo. Before that I built InstantArt on Next.js and scaled it to a million users in two months. So I've lived both sides of what you're building at Meloty — knowing what creators actually want, and owning the implementation.
One-liner: "I build the creator-facing layer for AI music — solo, in public, with real adoption — and I've run Next.js in production at a million users."
The three things every answer ties back to
Creator empathy — thousands use your tools daily; you are the target user.
Product judgment — you pick what to build from what users already hack around.
Implementation quality — you ship solid and keep it stable on a fast-moving backend.
Question drills
Tap a card to reveal the model answer. Turn on Drill mode (D) to blur answers and self-test — mark each Got it to fill the mastery meter.
Stack cheat sheet
You're React + Vite + TypeScript. They're Next.js + Node. Same React foundation — and you've shipped Next.js at scale.
You build
React the library — components + state
The core of ace-step-ui and HeartMuLa Studio. React 19, newest version. Components = reusable UI bricks; state re-renders only what changed.
Vite your build tool → SPA
Dev server + bundler. Produces a single-page app: code runs in the browser (client-side rendering). Perfect for local, Pinokio-run tools with zero infra cost.
Their stack
Next.js React framework + Node
File-based routing, server-side rendering (SSR) for speed + SEO, and API routes = full-stack. You built InstantArt on Next.js → 1M users. Real production experience.
The line when Next.js comes up: "Yes — I built InstantArt on Next.js and scaled it to a million users, so I've run Next.js in production at real scale. My music tools are React + Vite; same foundation, and I've shipped both." Honest, and much stronger than 'I've touched it.'
The difference in one sentence
Where does the code run first? With Vite (you) → in the user's browser, ideal for apps/tools/local. With Next.js (them) → can run on the server first, ideal for public web products, first-load speed, and SEO. Not better vs worse — different jobs, same React underneath.
Sell the hard parts, not the tech list
Anyone says "I know React." You shipped the hard parts of an AI music product:
Reference-audio and stems workflows as UX, not just buttons
Local-first storage with SQLite — privacy, offline, no infra
Kept a frontend stable on a fast-moving model backend
"I don't just know React — I've shipped exactly the surface Meloty lives on."
Questions you ask them
Asking well signals you think like a product owner. Listen ~60% of the time.
Product & direction
Where's the pull strongest right now — Meloty's music agent, video, or community? Where do you want to double down?
What's the biggest product bottleneck at 2 billion minutes of consumption?
Building your own models vs orchestrating existing ones — where's that going?
Role & team
What would be mine to own in the first 90 days?
Is this seat more product-leaning or implementation-leaning day to day?
How's the team distributed, and how do you keep velocity across timezones?
How do product decisions get made — founder-led, data-led, or team debate?
Business — speak Soheil's language
Is the content a flywheel for the fund, or is the fund separate?
What's the vision — a tool, a media label, or a platform?
Close
What would be a good next step, and what's your timeline?
Compensation
Don't name a number first. Anchor on Western value (Berlin / NY / London, remote-first), not on Romanian geography.
Conservative
€70–85k
or €5–6k/mo contractor · 0.1–0.3% equity
Realistic target
€90–115k
or €6–8k/mo contractor · 0.25–0.6% equity
Ambitious
€115–130k+
or €8–9k/mo contractor · up to ~1% equity
If pushed for a number: "Aligned with a Berlin/remote senior product role — but I'd want to understand scope and level first." Hold a floor around €70k. Always ask for equity — it's early stage, the upside is real.
// Full salary research with sourced benchmarks lives in the vault: Melotech-Salary-Research.md
Know the room
The founder thinks like an investor. Traction, growth and defensibility are his language — which is exactly your ammo.
Melotech
AI-native media platform music · video · creators
Berlin HQ + NY + London. ~10–12 people, remote-first. Founded 2023.
2 billion minutes consumed / 18 months
Real distribution, not a demo. Their traction number — reference it.
Try it before the call so you can speak from direct experience.
Guardrails
The difference between "impressive" and "trying too hard."
Do
Say the numbers: 4,300★, 15–20k Pinokio, 1M+ reach, #3 App Store, 1M InstantArt.
Talk about your projects as products, not hobbies.
Frame ACE-Step as a collaboration with founder Gong Junmin + early model access.
Mention InstantArt was Next.js the moment their stack comes up.
Note your wife runs the web studio → you're fully available.
Listen ~60%; tie every answer to creator empathy / product judgment / implementation quality.
Don't
Say "I need a job" or "I'll do anything" — you have leverage.
Call your projects "just side projects."
Claim ACE-Step paid you — you're unsure, so don't.
Criticize competitors directly — frame gaps as opportunities.
Undersell yourself on geography.
Hide the agency — but clarify your wife runs it.
Rehearsal audio
Local model voices, generated from your vault. Loop them on the way to the call.
Mock interview
~21 min
Full two-voice simulation covering every scenario — intro, motivation, product sense, engineering, growth, salary, curveballs, your questions, close.
voices: javert (interviewer) · marius (you)
Tech stack course
~15 min
Everything you should know about the stack and the questions both a technical and a product interviewer might ask — React, Vite, Next.js, SSR/CSR, TypeScript, state, Node, deployment, AI-product engineering.