Principal Product Designer

Remote OK
Full-time
October 29, 2025

Are you looking

To make meaningful changes at the fastest-growing tech company in Japan?
For a fair, highly flexible, inclusive working environment where anyone, regardless of their background, can make an impact?
To build the next bold idea in customer acquisition and revenue growth through conversational commerce technology
For a place where things are not just fast - but they happen now?

We Are Zeals - “Designing conversations. Driving conversions.”

Zeals is not another chatbot. Our automated chat solution and conversational technology change how consumers purchase or act online. Zeals converts customers who appear "unengaged" to become "valuable" through designed chat on Messaging Apps. Using AI-powered, human-designed conversation flows across chat platforms, Zeals enables brands to build personalized, automated conversations with their consumers and develop a deeper understanding of their preferences while creating a delightful, seamless shopping experience. Our last 3 years have been phenomenal. We have captured the heart of many businesses in Japan, with over 480 enterprises relying on our chat commerce offering to boost their mobile business.

The goal is simple: to “revolutionize hospitality on the Internet” by unlocking digital customer service experiences that were limited to physical stores previously.

Just Getting Started…

With more than 480 enterprise companies worldwide already utilizing our product, we are perfectly poised to seize market share and fuel exponential growth in the US market, with an eye on global expansion. Investors have taken note of our potential, leading us to recently secure nearly $40 million in funding, backed by Salesforce Ventures.

We’re now looking for a Principal Product Designer to lead the charge in raising the bar for experience design at Zeals — both through the craft of their work and the impact of their leadership.

As a Principal Product Designer

You’ll be one of the most senior hands-on designers at Zeals. You’ll drive high-stakes product initiatives from strategy through execution, shaping experiences that are both user-centered and business-critical. You’ll guide the evolution of our design systems, push interaction and visual design quality, and act as a mentor and role model for designers across the organization.

You’ll partner with leadership across product, engineering, research, and the business to set the vision, align priorities, and solve complex problems with creativity and clarity.

Your Typical Day With Us

Lead and execute critical product design initiatives with high visibility and business impact
Apply deep expertise in UX, UI, and interaction design to create elegant, scalable experiences
Set and influence product-wide design standards that raise the quality and consistency of our work
Partner with cross-functional leaders to shape product strategy and ensure the user voice is central in decision-making
Drive the evolution of our design system, enabling speed, consistency, and visual excellence at scale
Mentor and support other designers (both senior and junior), contributing to their growth and the strength of the overall team
Champion user-centered thinking across the organization, and elevate design’s role in achieving business outcomes
Identify opportunities for strategic research and partner with UX researchers to uncover actionable insights

What You’ll Need

8+ years of product design experience with a proven track record of leading high-impact projects
A portfolio that demonstrates exceptional design craft and strategic impact on products and teams
Mastery of UX, UI, and interaction design principles — with a sharp eye for detail and systems thinking
Experience setting or evolving design systems for large-scale products
Strong storytelling and communication skills — able to align, inspire, and influence stakeholders at all levels
Experience mentoring and supporting other designers to do their best work
Comfort operating in ambiguity and defining structure where needed
Proficiency in Figma; familiarity with design operations or workflow tools is a plus
Minimum JLPT N3 or equivalent; able to handle simple business communication

What makes you stand out

Experience working in conversational UI, chat products, or AI-powered interfaces
Background in SaaS, e-commerce, or marketing technology
Business-level Japanese language ability
Cross-cultural design experience or working with globally distributed teams

Don’t just take our word for it

Zeals has received the LinkedIn Top Startups award twice in a row. We believe this is a testament to our growth and our ability to attract great talents–who could potentially be your colleagues!

Ready to roll up our sleeves

We obsess over bringing hospitality to everyone–be it our customers or you! You’re an individual with unique needs. So, while we can’t attract you with ping-pong tables or all-you-can-drink espresso bars, we promise you a once-in-a-lifetime experience and co-workers that you can brag about to your friends, family, or anyone you meet the next time you go out for a party! . As an employer, we are ready to roll up our sleeves and change the status quo if it means making your experience better!

Salary Range : competitive
Performance review: twice a year
Holidays: 10 days of annual leave in the first year, weekends off, national holidays, summer and winter breaks, and 5 refreshment leave days per year
Visa support: We sponsor visas for the right candidates.
Flexible working: Highly flexible, remote-first organization (in Japan), Interim work from overseas
Housing allowance (within 1.5km away from office)
Club activity allowance
Team building allowance and Lunch allowance
Zeals Bar (bi-monthly free flow beer party)

Let’s build the future of digital hospitality — together.

If you’re a strategic, systems-minded designer who wants to shape not just products, but the culture of design in a growing tech company — we’d love to meet you.

Apply now and help us make the internet feel more human, one conversation at a time.

APPLY NOW ➜

About ZEALS

Build AI that Brings Japanese Omotenashi to the World

ZEALS is an AI company building intelligent products inspired by the Japanese concept of Omotenashi—anticipating people's needs and delivering exceptional experiences. What began as Japan's leading conversational commerce platform has evolved into an AI-native company developing products across autonomous AI agents and robotics.

Today, ZEALS operates three core businesses:

ZEALS AI Engagement, helping enterprise companies deliver personalized customer experiences through AI.
Omakase.ai, a platform for building autonomous AI agents capable of understanding, communicating, and taking action across voice and chat.
Omakase Robotics, developing a robot-agnostic AI operating system that enables robots to work naturally alongside people in real-world environments.

Together, these businesses share a single mission: creating AI that understands people, acts autonomously, and brings the spirit of Japanese hospitality to both digital and physical experiences.

From Market Leader to AI Pioneer

ZEALS established itself as the market leader in conversational commerce in Japan, working with hundreds of enterprise customers across industries including retail, beauty, travel, finance, and automotive.

Building on years of experience designing AI-powered customer interactions, the company has expanded into generative AI and embodied AI. Omakase.ai quickly gained international recognition after launching as the #1 Product of the Day on Product Hunt, with thousands of AI agents created by users within its first months. Meanwhile, Omakase Robotics is applying the same AI capabilities to the physical world, developing software that enables robots to perform meaningful work in human environments.

With teams spanning AI, machine learning, cloud infrastructure, robotics, and product engineering, ZEALS continues to invest aggressively in technologies that shape the future of intelligent systems.

Building the Future of AI

Rather than treating AI as a feature, ZEALS builds products where AI is the core technology. Engineers work across a wide range of challenging technical domains, including:

Autonomous AI agents
Voice AI and multimodal interaction
Large Language Models (LLMs)
Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)
Distributed cloud infrastructure
Robotics software
Computer vision
Real-time systems

Small, highly autonomous teams own products end-to-end, from research and prototyping to deployment and continuous iteration. Engineers collaborate closely with product managers, designers, and AI researchers to rapidly ship new capabilities and solve real-world customer problems.

A Place to Grow

ZEALS has built a culture around ownership, rapid learning, and continuous experimentation. Employees are encouraged to challenge assumptions, move quickly, and take responsibility for delivering meaningful outcomes. The company also supports collaboration beyond day-to-day work through cross-functional lunches, club activities, social events, and opportunities to connect across teams.

Japanese Language Policy
At ZEALS, the product and technology team members primarily speak English (dev-related discussions happen in English on Github or Slack). There might be occasional discussions in Japanese, but most Slack messages are in English (or both languages).

As for meetings, all dev-related discussions take place in English. Given the above, Japanese skills are not required for most positions in the Product & Technology departments. However, one unique aspect of ZEALS’ culture is the desire to increase teamwork and engage with each other, which is why many Japanese members are working on their English skills while many non-Japanese members also work to improve their Japanese skills.

In order to build a truly global team, ZEALS has many multilingual members that proactively support the rest of the team to ensure smooth communications.

Even outside of the Product & Technology departments, all important company-wide announcements are made in both English and Japanese. For example, hiring announcements, new product launches etc. are generally announced in both Japanese and English.

Also, simultaneous interpretation for presentations at large meetings and events is provided to ensure that everyone gets the information they need.
Paid Leave
- All Japanese public holidays off
- 10 days of PTO (awarded 3 months after joining) in the first year
- 5 refreshment leave days per year
- Summer Holidays, Year-end Holidays, Childcare Leave, Congratulations/Bereavement Leave
Benefits
Here are some examples of the benefits which full-time employees can receive:

💻 Loaned Laptops

🇯🇵 Translation Support (EN<>JP)

👶 Shorter Work Hours for Employees Taking Care of Children

👶 Parental Leave

👕 Flexible Dress Code

💜 Social Security / Insurance Benefits Included

🏥 Healthcare Insurance, Periodic Health Checks

💚 Pension Insurance

🚃 Commuter Reimbursement
Remote Work
Although ZEALS requires you to either be in or relocate to Japan, once you’re here, you can choose whether you work from home or in the office.
- Full-time employees in Japan can work from home or come to the office. Transportation reimbursement to and from the office is available and people living close to the office can receive a housing allowance.
- If you’re not based in Japan yet, you can work from overseas while we help you obtain a Japanese working visa.
- Work from your home country 2 months per year.
Work style
ZEALS is flexible when it comes to working hours. They have core time from 1:00pm to 3:00pm JST, but otherwise you’re free to set up your day however you want to meet the monthly working hour requirements.
Values

FROM ZEAL

< Passion >
Good things come from giving it your all

BET ON PARADOX

< Unorthodox >
Never settle for the established norm

UNITED WILL

< Team >
Teamwork is the heart of achievement

Office

The ZEALS office is in the heart of Tokyo, situated in Meguro, near Gajoen, a famous hotel known for hospitality. You can work from the office at a desk as well as use small booths or meeting rooms. You can hook your laptop to large screens and sit in Ergohuman chairs. Lounge areas and standing tables are also available. Everyone is free to choose the work style that works best for them, either full-remote or in the office.