The company’s chairman and CEO, Jensen Huang, was in Tokyo on Wednesday to speak at a corporate event.

He said: “Every industry, every company, every country must produce its own AI, a new industrial revolution. »

One of the pillars of the company’s cooperation with Japanese companies is a tie-up with the leading mobile operator SoftBank.

Nvidia has a significant share of the global AI chip market, with only a handful of chipmakers able to compete in the lucrative markets. Meanwhile, SoftBank sees AI as a major pillar of its business growth.

Both companies have developed technologies for processing AI data using cellular base stations rather than data centers.

SoftBank Group Chairman and CEO Son Masayoshi made an appearance at Wednesday’s event.

He noted that a connected intelligence network can become “a great neural brain” for Japan’s infrastructure intelligence.

What does the most valuable company in the world do?

Nvidia recently made headlines by replacing Intel in the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

Thanks to the growing demand for AI, Nvidia’s market value exceeded $3 trillion in June, becoming the world’s number one after overtaking Apple and Microsoft.

The American semiconductor giant designs and develops graphics processing units, or GPUs, electronic circuits capable of simultaneously processing images and large amounts of calculations. They are the workhorse of modern AI.

According to British research firm Omdia, semiconductors developed by Nvidia for AI, including GPUs, accounted for almost 80% of the global market share last year.

Many companies around the world are striving to source semiconductors from Nvidia.

Why focus on Japan?

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says he wants to secure an advantage in the AI ​​revolution by partnering with Japanese companies.

Huang says: “Japan has a long history of pioneering technological innovations with global impact. »

The American chipmaker has already announced plans to establish an R&D center in Japan, which it says will help support domestic companies.

Huang notes that “Japan is embarking on the AI ​​industrial revolution to become a global leader, ushering in a new era of growth in the telecommunications, transportation, robotics and healthcare sectors in a way that will benefit greatly to humanity.”

Invest in a Japanese unicorn

Nvidia is also partnering with Japanese generative AI developers to create chips that better meet demand.

In September, Tokyo-based startup Sakana AI announced that Nvidia would become a major shareholder. Co-founded by former Google researchers just a year ago, the R&D company is developing generative AI.

Ito Ren, COO of Sakana AI, said: “We want to use Nvidia’s funds to help create a world-class AI research center in Japan. »

Sakana AI hopes the partnership with Nvidia will accelerate its work on generative AI.

Nvidia and Japanese companies team up

Japanese companies are stepping up efforts to strengthen their businesses with AI and are partnering with Nvidia.

Hitachi announced a collaboration with Nvidia in March. They will jointly develop a server that accelerates AI processing and create technology to manage power plants, railways and factories in a virtual space called a metaverse or digital twin.

Major trading company Mitsui & Co. jointly launched a project with Nvidia to support the research and development of new drugs by pharmaceutical companies. Their supercomputers offer high-resolution molecular dynamics and generative AI models for drug discovery, and are accessible to Japanese pharmaceutical companies and startups.

NTT Data Group is also working with the American company on its digital twin projects.

Global competition is intensifying

With the emergence of Chat GPT, the use of artificial intelligence is spreading rapidly and competition to develop AI is intensifying among companies around the world.

American IT giants, collectively known as GAFAM (Google, Apple, Facebook or Meta, Amazon, Microsoft) are also working to develop AI. Some companies decide to invest and close startups that are at the forefront of development.

In addition to focusing on technology development, Japanese companies are also strengthening cooperation with leading AI development companies.

Among them, Japanese telecommunications giants NTT and LT, as well as electronics company NEC, have launched their own generative AI services for businesses since last March.

Meanwhile, telecommunications giant KDDI has made University of Tokyo-affiliated startup Elyza a subsidiary, and electronics company Fujitsu is partnering with North American startup Cohere.

In addition, startups and domestic research institutes are also developing this technology.

The market for GPUs and other accelerator chips for AI has seen hyper-growth in recent years. Research firm Omdia estimates it was below $10 billion in 2022 and is expected to exceed $150 billion by 2029.