Principal Software Engineer Job at Microsoft Corporation (Tokyo)

Principal Software Engineer

Microsoft Corporation

Location:
Japan , Tokyo

Category:
IT - Software Development

Contract Type:
Not provided

Salary:

Not provided

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Job Description:

As a Principal Software Engineer, you will provide technical leadership across the full Mico engineering stack. You will drive architecture decisions, set the engineering quality bar, and lead a globally distributed team spanning the US, Japan, and China (STCA) in building and scaling one of Microsoft's most visible consumer AI experiences. You will be responsible for the Picasso rendering engine, cross-platform animation delivery, LLM orchestration, long-term memory systems, and the adaptive personalization framework that makes Mico feel alive.

Job Responsibility:

Own the end-to-end system architecture for the Mico experience, spanning 3D rendering (Picasso stack / Babylon Native), real-time character animation, lip-sync, locomotion, and expression systems
Design and evolve the LLM orchestration layer that powers Mico's conversational intelligence, including prompt management, skill routing, and context window optimization
Architect the long-term memory system (Cosmos DB) — defining schemas, event handling, message partitioning, and retrieval strategies that enable Mico to remember and adapt to each user
Drive the adaptive personalization framework that governs how Mico adjusts behavior, tone, and interaction patterns based on user history and preferences
Architect solutions that work consistently across CMC (web), iOS, Android, and Windows surfaces, defining shared rendering abstractions and platform-specific optimizations
Coordinate Unified UI integration — ensuring Mico's visual presence (header, footer, composer, snap-to positioning) works seamlessly with the Copilot shell across all form factors
Own the asset pipeline: CDN-delivered 3D models, video backgrounds, animation configs, and per-surface configuration files
Design systems for millions of daily active users — low-latency rendering, efficient asset delivery via CDN, graceful degradation on low-end devices, and robust error recovery
Build and maintain observability dashboards using Azure Data Explorer (Kusto) to monitor Mico engagement, conversation duration, animation frame rates, and error rates across surfaces
Partner with data science to design controlled flights and ablation experiments, interpret telemetry, and use data to guide decisions

Requirements:

Bachelor's degree in computer science or a related technical discipline, along with at least 8 years of engineering experience, including proficiency in programming languages such as C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python
Extensive expertise in iOS and/or Android development
strong full-stack engineering capabilities with comprehensive knowledge of consumer product development
Demonstrated ability to lead through influence, establishing technical direction for teams of 3–10 engineers across US, Japan, and China time zones. Experienced in conducting architecture reviews, design sprints, and technical alignment sessions
Solid background in AI, including hands-on experience developing AI products or integrating AI into daily development processes
Speaking English is required for daily work.

Nice to have:

Ability to establish automated evaluation pipelines for 3D animation fidelity, lip-sync accuracy, expression transitions, and locomotion smoothness
Ability to drive mobile E2E test coverage and improve staging environment fidelity
Ability to define and enforce quality gates in CI/CD pipelines
Ability to own the security posture for Mico systems

Additional Information:

Job Posted:
April 27, 2026

Employment Type:

Fulltime

Work Type:

Hybrid work

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