Rakuten

As an engineer, I was disappointed that the more interesting people in this company tend to be in the business unit.

This is not a great place to learn for us.

One positive thing though: Not many Japanese companies can afford to get Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, or Oxbridge grads with good connections from abroad. So for a Japanese company, Rakuten has done well in this area (largely due to its relative fame).

Sadly, all the top talent are treated in the same way or worse than average employees. So, even my Princeton "douki" (colleague) for example, is doing stupid tasks and never given the opportunity to show what she can bring from outside. This is the bad thing about Japanese culture.

There will always be certain employees that are more capable than others. Instead of wasting time making them do stupid things that demotivate them and make them perform even worse than average employees, take the chance to see what they can do.