Home / About

About ExecutiveSearch.AI K.K.

Tokyo-based, founded 2017. In 2018 we built an AI for our own recruiting agency. We then opened it up. Today we operate two companies, the platform that runs the AI, and the agency that uses it.

The thesis

A recruiter's job is judgment. Reading a candidate, building rapport, navigating an offer, holding a process together: these things compound with experience and they don't compress. Everything else (sourcing, ranking, outreach drafting, candidate enrichment, market research) is bookkeeping. Bookkeeping is what computers are for.

That separation has been the company's operating principle since day one. We hire experienced bilingual recruiters, equip them with our own AI, and refuse to staff up around the bookkeeping. The result is a small team that places against a much larger output footprint than its headcount suggests.

Two companies, one engine

We operate Headhunt.AI, the AI recruiting platform, and AgentRPO, the agency that uses the platform on behalf of clients. Both run on the same engine. The difference is who's at the wheel.

Headhunt.AI is for buyers who want to operate the AI themselves: recruiting agencies extending their reach without adding headcount, in-house TA teams reducing dependence on external agencies. From ¥7500 a credit pack, 100 free credits at signup, no credit card. AgentRPO is for buyers who want the hires without the operating overhead: companies that need senior people in seats, fast, without standing up an internal sourcing team. Three engagement models (Contingency, Dedicated RPO, Tier-1 Premium), operated by our wholly-owned subsidiary ESAI Agency K.K. (license 13-ユ-319155).

Timeline

  1. 2017

    ExecutiveSearch.AI is founded in Tokyo

    Bootstrapped, two co-founders.

  2. 2018

    Japan's first AI-first recruiting agency goes live

    February 1, 2018. Pre-LLM, classical ML for matching.

  3. 2022

    GPT-3 in production

    Spring 2022. Two years before the rest of the industry treated LLMs as serious tools.

  4. 2023

    Acquired by Monstarlab Inc.

    October 2023. Joined the Monstarlab Inc. group (TSE Growth: 5255), gaining capital, scale, and the discipline of a public-company parent.

  5. 2024

    100% AI-powered outbound

    August 2024. Full transition, every scout mail bilingual, machine-drafted, profile-grounded. The agency now runs on its own platform with no manual sourcing.

  6. 2026

    Two-company structure

    February 1, 2026. Recruiting license transferred to a new wholly-owned subsidiary, ESAI Agency K.K. The platform (operated by ExecutiveSearch.AI K.K.) opens publicly as Headhunt.AI; the agency rebrands as AgentRPO.

What we publish

We don't run a marketing blog. We publish operator briefings: long-form, fully sourced, free, ungated. They live on our platform's content hub at headhunt.ai/insights and the cornerstone reference guides at headhunt.ai/learn. Anyone can read, link, or quote.

Where we are

Our office is in Ebisu, Tokyo. The team is bilingual. Every partner has been in Japan for 10+ years. We hire sparingly. When we do, we go long.

Get in touch

Press, partnerships, investor relations, legal: use this form or write directly to sales@executivesearch.ai. Product questions go faster through Headhunt.AI or AgentRPO.