Job DescriptionTranslated from Japanese
As one of the leaders driving Kauche's business growth, you will oversee the entire engineering organization.
1. Formulation and Execution of Technical Strategy
* Collaborate with management to formulate and execute group-wide technical policies and mid-to-long-term technical strategies.
* Drive technology selection and R&D with a view to future business growth, leading an AI-native business through technology.
* Be deeply involved in architectural design for product development and formulate and execute long-term plans to resolve technical debt.
2. Management of the Engineering Organization
* Manage the entire engineering organization, enhancing team productivity, health, and well-being.
* Support engineer recruitment, development, evaluation, and goal setting, and design career paths.
* Lead the design and continuous improvement of scalable and efficient development systems and processes that can keep pace with business growth speed.
3. Overall Project Oversight and Contribution to Business
* Collaborate with the CTO and each business unit to support the realization of the product roadmap from a technical perspective.
* Ensure successful large-scale projects by promoting appropriate personnel allocation and smooth communication with stakeholders inside and outside the team.
* Where necessary, you will be expected to contribute hands-on, including design, development, and code reviews, to deeply address on-site technical challenges.
* Contribute to business strategy decision-making from a technical standpoint in management meetings, etc.
*Scope of Change: All duties related to our business.
[Background of Recruitment]
Since our business transformation in 2023, Kauche has been providing a new shopping experience from "searching for what you want" to "discovering what you want" through an AI-powered discovery commerce model. This model shift has been successful, leading to a surge in enthusiastic customers and significant business growth.
We are continuously making bold updates to our product mechanisms and experiences to further accelerate growth and deliver value to more customers. We are actively recruiting for product development roles, including engineers, PdMs, and designers, and as the organization expands, the need for leaders to manage the technical organization has become increasingly important.
We are building our product development team with the basic policy of "increasing business scale relative to organizational scale and devising ways to achieve it." We aim to grow an AI-native business with an AI-native development organization. We are seeking a VPoE to achieve this ambitious challenge together.
In this position, you will collaborate with management and development team leaders to plan and execute measures to solve organizational challenges and promote the growth of engineers. This role involves creating the future of Kauche's technical organization by engaging both internally and externally, from building organizational foundations such as engineer recruitment and evaluation systems to technical and recruitment PR in collaboration with DevRel and HR.
*Required Skills/Experience*
* 3+ years of practical experience in roles such as Engineering Manager, VPoE, or equivalent in the IT/Internet industry.
* Experience managing an engineering organization of 20 or more people.
* Experience as a Tech Lead, team building, and process improvement.
* Ability to drive software development with ownership.
* Experience in formulating technical strategy and involvement in architectural design.
* Proven track record of improving development systems and processes to enhance overall organizational productivity.
*Welcome Skills/Experience*
* Experience leading organizational expansion from 30 to 100 people from a technical perspective.
* Experience contributing to business strategy decision-making from a technical viewpoint as a member of the management team.
* Deep knowledge of technologies related to Kauche's business domain, such as EC, AI/Machine Learning, and building/operating platforms used by a large number of users.
* Experience in developer community activities and technical/recruitment PR (DevRel).
* Experience in formulating and executing long-term plans to resolve technical debt.
* Development and operational experience with Go and Google Cloud.
* Frontend, mobile app development experience, or PM experience.
*Desired Personality Traits*
* Empathy with Kauche's MISSION, VISION, and VALUES.
* Strong desire to contribute to the grand goal of "1 trillion yen in corporate value with 100 people" through the power of technology.
* Leadership and courage to enjoy uncertainty and tackle challenges with no clear answers.
* Ability to contribute to strategic decision-making by taking a bird's-eye view of the entire business, not just the product, as a member of the management team.
* Empathy with the philosophy of a highly lean organization and the ability to lead the team hands-on.
* Desire to take on challenges in a unique, massive market exceeding 10 trillion yen.
* A belief, however small, that there is potential in the EC experience.
* Desire to take on challenges in a rapidly changing environment from 0→1, 1→10, 10→100, 1000.
*Attractions of the Job*
■ Product Features
Kauche is a discovery-based social EC app.
Discovery commerce refers to an EC experience that is the opposite of traditional search-based EC, where you "search for what you want and buy it." Instead, it offers an experience where you "discover and buy what you want while browsing casually."
Through serendipitous encounters with sale items and participatory features like reviews and quests, we are creating a place where shopping becomes an emotionally moving experience beyond mere purchasing.
As of March 2026, we have surpassed 6 million cumulative downloads, with users spread evenly across the country. A notable characteristic is that a large proportion of our users are women aged 40-50 who have had little prior experience with EC.
Features like "Kauche Farm," a crop-growing game, and "Minna no Post," a posting feature, provide rich elements for daily enjoyment. Many users engage with the app frequently, averaging 38 minutes per day and visiting more than 20 days a month, exhibiting behaviors entirely different from traditional EC users.
■ The World Kauche Aims to Create
With the mission of "Bringing Fun into Daily Life," Kauche is creating "a new form of living sphere."
Our goal is to restore human richness, such as discovery, serendipity, and a moderate buzz, to the online shopping experience, which tends to focus on search and optimization. A place where you can find something interesting just by stopping by, feel at ease seeing familiar faces, and want to linger. We are shaping a hub where people naturally gather and integrate into their daily rhythms, like a town square or shopping street, through the multiplication of social, entertainment, and commerce.
Information gathering, playing, and shopping are all loosely connected within the same flow, and shopping, which had become a chore, transforms into enjoyment.
Since our business transformation in 2023, we have achieved a 30x increase in GMV, a 252x increase in gross profit, and a 68x increase in DAU in two and a half years.
We continue to update conventions with an operating model that leverages change, not dependent on headcount.
Our vision is to become a living infrastructure where 100 million people experience 100 million different kinds of enjoyment.
We aim for 1 trillion yen in corporate value with 100 employees and will carve out the living sphere that should be the main stage of retail in 10 years.
*Development Environment*
*Backend Engineer*
* Language: Go
* API: Protocol Buffers, gRPC
* Infrastructure: Google Cloud (Cloud Run, Cloud Firestore, Cloud Spanner, etc.)
* CI/CD: GitHub Actions, Cloud Build
* Configuration Management: Terraform
* Monitoring: Cloud Monitoring, Cloud Logging, Cloud Trace
*iOS Engineer*
* Development Environment: Xcode
* Development Language: Swift
* UI: SwiftUI / UIKit
* API Communication: Protocol Buffers / SwiftProtobuf
* Architecture: MVVM
* Monitoring: Crashlytics
* CI/CD: Bitrise, GitHub Actions
*Android Engineer*
* IDE: Android Studio
* Development Language: Kotlin
* Build Tool: Gradle
* API Communication: Protocol Buffers
* Key Libraries/SDKs: Kotlin Coroutines, Android Architecture Components, Jetpack Compose, Accompanist, etc.
* Analytics Platform: BigQuery, Looker Studio
* Monitoring: Crashlytics
* CI/CD: Bitrise, GitHub Actions
*ML Engineer*
* Development Language: Python
* Infrastructure: Google Cloud (Vertex AI, BigQuery, Spanner, etc.), Terraform
*Common*
* Analytics Platform: BigQuery, Looker Studio
* Other: GitHub, Slack, Notion, Figma
*Employment Type*
Full-time employee (No fixed term)
*Probationary Period*
Yes (3 months)
*No changes in treatment or conditions during the probationary period.
*Salary*
Annual salary: ¥13,200,000 - ¥27,000,000
*Minimum Annual Salary (10,000 JPY)*
1320
*Maximum Annual Salary (10,000 JPY)*
2700
*Work Location*
Asia Building 9F, 1-12-16 Jinnan, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150-0041
Frequency of Commuting: Hybrid (3 days in office per week)
*Scope of Change: Headquarters and all company branches and sales offices nationwide.
*Working Hours*
Flextime system (applies to all full-time positions)
* Standard working hours: 8 hours per day
* Flexible time: 6:00 - 22:00
* Core time: 11:00 - 15:00
* Break time: 1 hour, taken freely
*Break Time*
60 minutes
*Overtime Work*
Yes
*Holidays, Paid Leave, Special Leave*
* Complete two-day weekend system (including national holidays, year-end holidays, etc.)
* Annual paid leave
* Special leave (5 days upon joining)
* F-Leave (Leave for women's health issues/examinations/once a month)
* Congratulatory and condolence leave
* Maternity and childcare leave
* Leave for childcare, etc.
*Benefits*
* Stock options that do not expire after leaving the company.
* Club activity system (partial subsidy for activity expenses).
* Book and seminar subsidy system.
* Subsidy for welcome and farewell parties.
*Allowances*
* Commuting allowance (up to ¥30,000 per month)
* Referral recruitment allowance
* KAUpos allowance (peer bonus system)
*Insurance Enrollment*
Health Insurance / Employees' Pension Insurance / Long-term Care Insurance / Employment Insurance / Workers' Accident Compensation Insurance
*Measures to Prevent Passive Smoking at the Workplace*
No smoking indoors in principle (smoking area available)
*Education, Skill Improvement, Career Advancement*
Book and seminar subsidy system
*Health*
Consultation available with contracted medical professionals and industrial physician.
*Interview/Selection Process*
Document screening → Interviews (multiple) → Assignment evaluation → Reference check → Final selection
*Other*
*This position requires a high level of communication in Japanese, therefore, Japanese proficiency equivalent to JLPT N1 or higher is a mandatory requirement.
*Recruitment Page*
https://enjoy-working.kauche.com