QA Automation Engineer

Rakuten International is a division of Rakuten Group, Inc., a Japanese global technology leader in services that empower individuals, communities, businesses and society. Headquartered in San Mateo, California with more than 4,000 employees worldwide, the Rakuten International business portfolio includes market leaders in e-commerce, digital marketing, advertising, communications and entertainment.

We are seeking a proactive Quality Engineer to join our dynamic team in San Mateo. In this role, you will be instrumental in ensuring the quality of our web applications, mobile apps, and backend services. You will move beyond traditional testing to adopt AI‑first workflows, translating requirements into actionable test strategies and autonomous automation coverage. This is an exciting opportunity for someone who thrives in fast‑evolving environments, excels in containerized infrastructure
, and wants to leverage AI Agents to contribute significantly to software excellence.

• AI‑First Quality Ownership:
  Own end‑to‑end quality for assigned features by defining test strategy, leveraging AI to generate test coverage, and ensuring continuous validation across the development lifecycle. Partner with cross‑functional teams to align on product goals and release readiness.
• Intelligent Risk Detection:
  Use AI‑assisted analysis to evaluate requirements, system behavior, and production signals to identify edge cases, gaps in coverage, missing telemetry, flaky automation, and environment drift early.
• AI‑Driven Automation:
  Build, maintain, and optimize UI, API, and end‑to‑end automated tests using Python, Java, or JavaScript/Type Script. Actively leverage AI coding assistants and autonomous test agents to improve efficiency, scalability, and coverage.
• Infrastructure & CI/CD:
  Deploy and validate services in containerized environments (Docker, Kubernetes). Integrate AI‑driven testing into CI/CD pipelines to enable continuous, automated quality signals on every change.
• Agent‑Based Execution & Validation:
  Utilize AI agents to execute user flows, perform exploratory testing, and validate UI and system behavior across environments. Apply AI‑driven visual validation against Figma designs to ensure design‑to‑implementation fidelity.
• Backend & Performance Testing:
  Validate complex backend behavior, including event‑driven workflows, message queues, async pipelines, and data integrity. Use AI‑assisted techniques to detect anomalies, validate data integrity (SQL), and surface system‑level issues.
• Quality Signals, Triage & Advocacy:
  Leverage AI to triage defects, cluster failures, and identify root causes. Communicate insights clearly to stakeholders and advocate for AI‑first quality practices across the SDLC.

• Programming & AI‑First Automation:
  Proficiency in Python, Java, or JavaScript/Type Script, with the ability to use LLMs to generate and maintain test automation. Experience testing OpenAPI/REST APIs (Graph
  
  QL a plus) and validating data using SQL.
• AI Proficiency:
  Proven experience integrating LLMs and AI agents into QA workflows to drive automation and efficiency, including AI‑assisted test generation, failure analysis, and defect triage.
• AI‑Native Visual & UI Testing:
  Experience leveraging Figma as a source of truth and applying AI agents (e.g., Claude) with platforms like Browser Stack to automate UI validation. Ability to generate tests from design, perform agent‑driven exploratory testing, and use AI for semantic visual validation and intelligent defect triage across devices and browsers.
• Infrastructure
  
  Skills:
  
  Working knowledge of CI/CD systems (e.g., Git Hub Actions) and containerized environments (Docker and Kubernetes), with the ability to troubleshoot common test environment failures.
• Collaboration & Strategy:
  Ability to develop practical, feature‑level test strategies, clearly communicate coverage and risks, and demonstrate an eagerness to adopt emerging AI‑driven engineering practices.

• 3 to 5 years of experience in Quality Assurance.
• 2+ years of experience in Test Automation (Web/Mobile/API).
• 1+ years of experience with Docker/Kubernetes.
• Bachelor’s degree in…