Fostering Order in the Indo-Pacific: What the European can learn
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December 2024
- Japan Airlines services are restored following disruptions caused by what are believed to have been DDoS cyberattacks / full item
- Japan: Here’s an overview of items covered in the recent, second CBDC liaison meeting between the Bank of Japan and related government ministries / full item
- An intro here to Japan Smart Chain, an Ethereum-based blockchain, validated onshore in Japan by Japanese industrials, optimized for Japanese regulations and consumer protections / full item
- Japan: TechGALA 2025, Aichi Prefecture’s first international startup conference, took place February 4-6 – meet the 16 startup finalists that pitched / full item
- A Japanese lawmaker has asked the government to launch a national Bitcoin reserve, citing similar discussions in Brazil and the United States / full item
- Japan: Here’s a brief interview with the Co-Founder and General Partner of Incubate Fund Asia, Japan’s largest venture capital firm / full item
- A brief look at the recent 2024 Innovation Leaders Summit in Tokyo, and the Australian tech firms and startups, including Quantum Brilliance and Novalith, that presented / full item
Japan: ‘About 90% of the world’s advanced chips are produced by [TSMC] whose model involves operating at massive scale… If Rapidus succeeds, it would challenge both the economics and geography of the industry’ / full item
- Japan: United States Space Force activated its first unit in Yokota Air Base, Tokyo, in cooperation with Japan’s Air Self-Defense Force’s military space operations group / full item
- Japan: An overview of OpenAI’s decision earlier this year to open its first Asia office in Tokyo / full item
- SusHi Tech Tokyo 2025 conference is set for May in Tokyo, featuring tech startup pitch competition, and exhibition opportunities / full item
- A PDF intro to Japan’s Neo-Yamakoshi Village in ‘Digital Citizens Wanted – Japan village grows population with NFTs, Web3 tools’ from Yuri Group’ / full item
- Japan: Gov’t to dissolve existing web3 Project Team, instead creating dedicated unit in Digital Society Promotion department, tho full responsibilities are not yet defined / full item
- Japan’s Toyota and Vietnam’s Vin Phuc province ink MOU to boost collaboration and investment in key sectors including manufacturing, automotive, and electric vehicles / full item
- Taiwan: Japan’s Tokyo Electron, Asia’s biggest semicon equipment supplier, launches $61.5M center in Tainan, looking to boost capacity to meet growing demand / full item
- Singapore asset manager, Keppel, and Vietnam’s Sovico conglomerate are discussing plans for new SEA undersea cables, with direct connection to Japan, tho agreement has not yet been reached / full item
- New Zealand’s Zenno Astronautics gains backing from Mitsubishi Electric ME Innovation Fund with superconducting tech for space and satellite control applications / full item
Old age poverty and active ageing in ASEAN: Trends
November 2024
- Japan: STATION Ai is now open in Nagoya City, Japan’s largest open innovation hub with offerings including accelerators, financial support, partnerships outside Japan and more / full item
- European and Japanese space agencies issue joint statement on boosting cooperation on areas including planetary defense, moon exploration, Mars missions and more / full item
- Japan: TechGala 2025 is set for February in Nagoya, delivering 3 days of inspiration, information and connections / full item
“AI Safety Institutes, or AISIs, are one of the most important new structures to emerge in international AI policy…” / full item
- Japan: A quick intro to the Kansai Startup Mashups initiative, and 6 firms from the program working on smart homes tech, AI for business, and other deep-tech solutions / full item
- Japan: Gov’t commits over $65 billion in additional funding for semiconductor and AI tech development to 2030, with Rapidus a key beneficiary / full item
- Japan and Peru are set to ink collaboration agreement on minerals mining, with Japan providing development and tech expertise to resource-rich Peru / full item
- Japan: Bank of Yokohama and IBM partnered to trial generative AI for loan document creation, seeing potential time savings of up to 19,500 human processing hours annually / full item
- Japan’s NTT DATA partners Google Cloud, looking at customized tech stacks for enterprize customers in healthcare, finance, manufacturing and more / full item
- Japan: Gov’t partners Tenstorrent, a Silicon Valley AI chip firm, to train up to 200 chip designers over 5 years, as part of Japan’s bid to develop its semiconductor industry / full item
Video: The showcase flight in Japan of Joby Aviation’s ‘flying car’, an electric vertical take-off and landing vehicle / on YouTube
- ‘Invest Tokyo Webinar 2024 for Oceania’ is set for November 8th, looking to boost overseas startup awareness of the benefits and resources available from a base in Tokyo / full item
- Malaysia’s Entomal Biotech takes overall win at the Asian Entrepreneurship Award 2024 in Japan, with New Zealand’s Formus taking 2nd place / full item
- Thailand: Japan’s Toshiba and Naturenix partner for SCiB lithium-ion battery brand in Thailand, manufacturing units for subscription packages to 2-wheeled e-bike users / full item
- Japan’s Hyundai Motor has partnered China’s HaomoAI autonomous driving software firm for China-market EV, set to feature generative AI-backed DriveGPT systems / full item
- Cambodia: Japan’s NTT Docomo and Nippon Electric Company partner for ‘Orex Sai’ 4g wireless in Cambodia, creating a base for future 5G services / full item
Critical technologies, globally, in January 2025
October 2024
- Japan’s JPYC, issuer of yen-pegged stablecoin, partners South Korea’s ITCEN IT major for stablecoin research, particularly focusing on integrations with real-world assets / full item
- Japan: Toyota and NTT telecoms giant partner for R&D on driver assistance systems, looking to leverage artificial intelligence, and optical communications technology / full item
- Japan: Researchers complete early test, capturing solar energy in space for conversion and transmission to ground stations on Earth / full item
- Japan: Logistics and shipbuilding firms, and gov’t and political organizations, were hit by a Russia-based cyber-attack / full item
- Japan: A look at Project Pax cross border payment system, involving big-3 banks, MUFG, SMBC and Mizuho, integrating Swift messaging with a stablecoin system / full item
- Japan: Rapidus chipmaker and Denso auto supplier partner to share design methods for advanced chips, targeting standardization in Japan for AI and autonomous vehicles / full item
- Japan: Gov’t rolls out plans for a 300MW wind farm off Hokkaido coast to boost energy for new Rapidus semiconductor manufacturing facility, and new SoftBank data centre / full item
- Japan: Gov’t commits to quantum encryption by 2030, enlisting Toshiba, NEC and others with public-private investment over 5 years to prepare for next-gen cyber-attacks / full item
- Japan: Honda-backed Ashirase launches device for the visually-impaired, guiding individuals via shoe-worn device that vibrates based on information from a smartphone app / full item
- Masayoshi Son, founder of Japan’s SoftBank Group, sees AI tech running a range of daily household activities inside 2-3 years, covering health, payments, ordering and more / full item
- Japan’s PM: “Using blockchain technology, NFTs, and more, we will look to maximize the value of a multitude of analog local products, such as food and tourism experiences…” / full item
- Canada’s Pangaea Ventures VC firm sharpens Asia focus with Japan office, targeting deeptech startups with new $85M fund / full item
- Malaysia’s GHL online payments firm and Japan’s JCB International ink strategic partnership, opening JCB Cards payments to GHL merchants in Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines / full item
- Philippines: Ayala Corp to sell 50% of shares in Mynt, parent of GCash – and JV between China’s Ant Group, Philippines’ Globe Telecom and Ayala – to Japan’s Mitsubishi in $318M deal / full item
- South Korea, Japan and the US are to boost joint efforts to combat North Korea’s hacking activities, in response to a rise in attacks on global virtual currency exchanges / full item
Podcast: Why should we care about the Indo-Pacific?
