Business Development Lead, Japan & Korea

Our mission at Duolingo is to develop the best education in the world and make it universally available. But we’ve got more left to do — and that’s where you come in!

Duolingo is the world's most popular learning app. Beyond our core learning product, we also offer English proficiency testing with the Duolingo English Test, and are bringing new subjects into the Duolingo app, where people can develop their Math, Music and Chess skills.

We are passionate about educating our users, making fact-based decisions, and finding innovative solutions to complex problems. We offer meaningful work, limitless learning opportunities, and collaboration with world-class minds. Come brighten your life and over half a billion more!

Read our blog to learn more.

About the role...

Scale our existing partnership model to Asia.

Come lead partnerships and business development for Duolingo in Japan and Korea!

Partnerships are a growing function at Duolingo, with a New York-based team looking after opportunities globally. As the scope of partnerships and market focus expands, we are seeking an experienced business development leader to help us take a strategic, structured and proactive approach to growing our business in our key APAC markets, starting in Japan and Korea.

Based in Tokyo, you will build our partnerships pipeline in Japan and Korea, and develop business cases for strategic partnerships with companies that can drive brand awareness, monetization and user growth.

As our resident expert on the region, you will demonstrate a deep understanding of the region’s market dynamics and business development landscape, and use your skills and network to build value-accretive partnerships to Duolingo and our partners. Reporting to the Global Head of Business Development, you will work closely with product, marketing and engineering teams in the US and around the world.

:brain: You will...

• Leverage market insights and understanding of the partnership landscape to develop and communicate an effective strategy for partnerships in Japan (and Korea)


• Build a pipeline of strategic partners across verticals (app stores, telcos, media and entertainment, banks, payment providers, etc.)


• Grow our portfolio by sourcing new opportunities with measurable impact to key business metrics in your region


• Build compelling and quantifiable business cases for strategic bets to pursue in the region


• Negotiate and implement partnerships across monetization, brand and user growth


• Work closely with Product/Engineering to influence product integrations vital to get strategic partnerships off the ground


• Collaborate with global and local Marketing teams to amplify partnership launches through buzz-worthy activations

:check: You have...

• 7+ years of business development experience having successfully developed partnerships in the digital consumer tech (B2C) space


• Strong understanding of the APAC market having worked in Japan and/or other priority APAC markets


• Experience in conceiving, developing, and implementing partnerships throughout their full cycles, from deal sourcing, to building business cases, negotiating agreements, driving and tracking results


• Work experience in consulting or investment banking


• Culturally clued up and immersed in regional players, and able to use your network to launch impactful partnerships


• Ambitious spirit with a track record of achieving great results by building long-lasting external relationships, collaborating effectively with multiple internal teams to drive ideas to execution, and taking a test and scale approach


• Critical thinking and structured thought process, with skills to build and communicate compelling, data-driven narratives


• Ability to travel internationally frequently, specifically to Pittsburgh (HQ) and New York

:star: Exceptional candidates will have...

• Experience with mobile apps and subscription services a strong plus


• Lived and worked in multiple APAC markets


• MBA from reputable university


• Proficiency in a 3rd language


• Excitement for our mission to make high-quality language learning accessible to everyone