Editor profile
Senior Analyst, Corporate Innovation
Elena Vance investigates how Japan's corporate giants implement AI and digital innovation strategies. She provides a comparative international perspective on Japan's industrial upgrading.
elena.vance@japantechreview.comPwC Japan Group's report points out that AI is evolving from generative AI to physical AI, and Japan's industrial value chain will face restructuring. This article provides an in-depth analysis of how Japan is leveraging AI to address its population crisis and seize the competitive high ground in the era of physical AI.
Renub Research predicts that the Asia-Pacific AI market will reach $890.7 billion by 2033. This article takes a Japanese perspective to analyze how companies such as Hitachi and Advantest establish differentiated competitiveness in the Asia-Pacific AI wave through industrial automation and semiconductor testing technology.
From the birthplace of quantum annealing theory to a core market in the global quantum industry landscape, Japan is becoming an important player in the era of quantum technology.
The IEA report shows that global electric vehicle sales grew by 35% in 2023, but Japan clearly lags behind in major automotive markets. This article interprets the competitive landscape behind this trend and Japan's technological choices from the perspective of Japan's technology industry.
Based on market forecasts from 2025 to 2035, this analysis examines the structural changes in Japan's process automation and instrumentation industry, exploring how the automotive, semiconductor, and green manufacturing sectors are driving the restructuring of Japan's industrial competitiveness.
Microsoft announced an investment of $10 billion in Japan over the next three years, focusing on AI infrastructure, cybersecurity, and talent training, marking a new investment paradigm for multinational tech giants in the sovereign AI era.
NVIDIA Cosmos has formed a strategic alliance with Japanese robotics and manufacturing giants, marking the evolution of physical AI from a single technology into an industrial ecosystem. Based on NVIDIA's official news, this article provides an in-depth analysis of the significance of this collaboration for the paradigm reconstruction of Japan's manufacturing industry and the global competitive landscape.
Fujitsu and Tokyo University of Science have announced the establishment of a collaborative research cluster for quantum and HPC infrastructure, focusing on quantum hardware talent development and technology research and development. This article analyzes the profound significance of this collaboration for Japan's quantum competitiveness, the industry-academia collaboration model, and the next-generation computing ecosystem.
Japan has partnered with Nvidia through the FRONTia project, joining forces with domestic manufacturing giants to build the world's first national-level physical AI infrastructure, aiming to capture over 30% of the global AI robot market by 2040.
Interpreting the Japanese physical AI strategy behind Jensen Huang's visit to Japan, analyzing how the collaboration between Noetra, the robot alliance, and Toyota reshapes the competitiveness of Japan's manufacturing industry.
Toyota and NVIDIA are expanding their collaboration from autonomous driving to manufacturing, smart cities, and transportation systems, reflecting the cautious yet pragmatic digital transformation path of Japanese manufacturing in the AI era.
Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) research team, inspired by the tip of an elephant's trunk, developed the EleTac soft robot gripper, which combines pneumatic flexible structure with visual-tactile perception and deep learning, achieving high-precision force perception and gentle grasping. This breakthrough is expected to drive a paradigm shift in the fields of service robots and precision manipulation.
This article analyzes the Japanese government's plan to invest 370 trillion yen (approximately 2.3 trillion USD) in 17 strategic areas by 2040, with a focus on AI, chips, and space development. It explores how this plan marks a shift in Japan's tech industry from economic catch-up to technological sovereignty and may reshape the global semiconductor and innovation competition landscape.
The semiconductor supply chain manages risks, materials, and data in an engineered way, and its resilient thinking is worth learning from for Japanese manufacturing.
NTT is preparing a fund of about $500 million, partnering with companies from Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan to accelerate investments around IOWN, AI semiconductors, and the optoelectronic convergence ecosystem. This is not merely an industrial fund, but a strategic move by Japan to push competition in the infrastructure of the AI era from the compute center up to the network architecture layer.
Japan is currently using Osaka and the Kansai region to reorganize its narrative around technology investment: centering on robotics, artificial intelligence, semiconductors, and advanced manufacturing, it seeks to attract overseas companies into the Japanese market while testing an open innovation entry point that is closer to the industrial front line.
TEPCO Solution Advance and Accenture have launched a five-year AI-driven operational redesign initiative, with the goal of creating a cumulative value of more than 10 billion yen. This is not just a corporate digitalization partnership; it also reflects how Japan’s utilities, outsourcing services, and infrastructure operations are entering a phase of AI-centered redesign.