Director, Standards and Compliance

Why should you choose us?

Rakuten Symphony is reimagining telecom, changing supply chain norms and disrupting outmoded thinking that threatens the industry's pursuit of rapid innovation and growth. Based on proven modern infrastructure practices, its open interface platforms make it possible to launch and operate advanced mobile services in a fraction of the time and cost of conventional approaches, with no compromise to network quality or security. Rakuten Symphony has operations in Japan, the United States, Singapore, India, South Korea, Europe, and the Middle East Africa region. For more information, visit:

Building on the technology Rakuten used to launch Japan's newest mobile network, we are taking our mobile offering global.

To support our ambitions to provide an innovative cloud-native telco platform for our customers, Rakuten Symphony is looking to recruit and develop top talent from around the globe. We are looking for individuals to join our team across all functional areas of our business – from sales to engineering, support functions to product development.

Let's build the future of mobile telecommunications together

About Rakuten Group, Inc. (TSE: 4755) is a global leader in internet services that empower individuals, communities, businesses and society. Founded in Tokyo in 1997 as an online marketplace, Rakuten has expanded to offer services in e-commerce, fintech, digital content and communications to approximately 1.9 billion members around the world. The Rakuten Group has over 30,000 employees, and operations in 30 countries and regions. For more information visit

Job Purpose: The Head of Standards & Compliance will lead the strategic definition, implementation, and operational alignment of global telecom standards across the OSS product portfolio (RIO, Site Manager, and AI platform). This role ensures internal adherence and external alignment with key telecom standards (3GPP, TMF, ETSI NFV, ORAN), regulatory frameworks, and Rakuten Symphony's commitment to openness, interoperability, and modularity. This leader will serve as the primary point of engagement for external bodies while translating specifications into actionable design and engineering guidance. This position is pivotal to OSS portfolio differentiation as a standards-aligned, cloud-native OSS platform capable of driving multi-vendor adoption and integration. The role is also responsible for risk mitigation, product compliance, and supporting regulatory posture in global markets

Job Requirements:

Standards Strategy & Governance

• Develop a unified strategy for telecom standards adoption across OSS products.
• Drive internal implementation of compliance practices aligned to 3GPP, TMF, ORAN, ETSI NFV, and CNCF.
• Establish and lead the OSS Standards Governance Board.

External Engagement & Representation

• Act as Rakuten's primary delegate to external standards bodies and industry working groups.
• Engage in shaping upcoming standards through contributions and formal feedback.
• Foster collaborations with global operators and forums (e.g., ORAN Alliance, TM Forum Catalyst).

Internalization of Standards

• Define and maintain an internal compliance index across all OSS products.
• Translate complex specifications into architecture patterns, design guidelines, and engineering blueprints.
• Work with product architects to embed standards into product and platform components.

Regulatory & Security Compliance

• Ensure OSS products support regional and international regulatory requirements.
• Support security compliance efforts including lawful intercept, service assurance, and data protection.
• Partner with DevSecOps to integrate automated compliance checks into CI/CD.

Tooling, Traceability & Certification

• Lead initiatives for tooling that support automated validation and traceability of compliance.
• Manage engagements with certification agencies and facilitate interoperability testing.

Team Building & SME Enablement

• Build and mentor a distributed team of domain-specific compliance architects.
• Drive a knowledge culture via internal training, compliance playbooks, and standards library.

REQUIRED KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE:

Experience and Expertise

• 15+ years in Telecom or OSS domains, with at least 5 years leading standards or compliance functions.
• Deep understanding of 3GPP architecture (RAN, Core, OSS), TM Forum Open APIs, ETSI NFV, ORAN specifications.
• Proven experience in productizing standards into commercially deployed platforms.
• Experience navigating compliance in multi-regulatory and multi.

Technical & Domain Skills

• Strong systems understanding across service orchestration, assurance, and cloud-native OSS.
• Familiarity with DevSecOps pipelines, API standardization, and observability frameworks.
• Demonstrated ability to bridge architecture, engineering, and external standards.

Telecom and Cloud Knowledge

• In-depth understanding of Telecom networks and specifications, particularly 3GPP NFV and MANO.
• Experience in building virtualization platforms for Telecom Network and Management Functions.
• Comprehensive understanding of Cloud Native principles and Microservices application architectures.
• Working knowledge with one of the public clouds - AWS, GCP, or Azure.

Leadership & Collaboration

• Experience leading matrixed teams and driving cross-org influence.
• Comfortable interfacing with legal, sales, partners, and external regulatory stakeholders.
• High clarity in communication - able to translate between technical, business, and regulatory languages.

Educational Background

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Telecommunications, Computer Science, or related field.
• Certification or contribution history in standards bodies (e.g., TMF, 3GPP, ORAN) is a plus.

Additional Skills

• Virtualization, Cloud native architectures, Kubernetes and Cloud environments.
• Good understanding of Agile principles and processes.
• Understanding of AIML
• Experience working in a fluid, start-up-like environment.

RAKUTEN SHUGI PRINCIPLES:

Our worldwide practices describe specific behaviours that make Rakuten unique and united across the world. We expect Rakuten employees to model these 5 Shugi Principles of Success.

• Always improve, always advance. Only be satisfied with complete success - Kaizen.
• Be passionately professional. Take an uncompromising approach to your work and be determined to be the best.
• Hypothesize - Practice - Validate - Shikumika. Use the Rakuten Cycle to success in unknown territory.
• Maximize Customer Satisfaction. The greatest satisfaction for workers in a service industry is to see their customers smile.
• Speed Speed Speed Always be conscious of time. Take charge, set clear goals, and engage your team.