The Yomiuri Shimbun

The Japanese government has set out a policy to establish hubs of industry, government and academia at state research institutions to promote the development of dual-use technologies, such as artificial intelligence and semiconductors.

According to the draft of the 2026 Integrated Innovation Strategy, which the government is formulating to advance technological innovation, studies are also underway on a plan to establish defense technology research hubs outside of universities. This would help create a research framework with strengthened measures to protect technology.

The strategy is formulated annually and is expected to be approved by the Cabinet as early as the beginning of July.

Proposing an organic linkage between science, technology and security, the draft outlines a policy for industry, government and academia to collaborate on the development of dual-use technologies and the training of personnel. The government has set out a goal to create markets that contribute to both strengthening security and fostering economic growth.

By fiscal 2030, the government plans to establish centers dedicated to the development of dual-use technologies and other areas within national research and development agencies, according to the draft.

Focusing on the development of critical technologies such as AI, quantum computing and semiconductors, industry-government-academia collaboration centers, where researchers from universities and companies can conduct research, will be established at institutions such as Riken and the National Institute for Materials Science.

Regarding defense technology, the government will consider establishing off-campus facilities accessible to researchers from universities and national research and development agencies to strengthen work from the basic research stage onward.

Referred to as off-campus initiatives, these efforts aim to create a research environment equipped with advanced safeguards prepared against cyberattacks and other threats to prevent potential technology leaks.

The draft also incorporated substantial expansions of the government's grants-in-aid for scientific research and operating grants for national universities, as well as the promotion of AI-driven research and development.

It called for advancing the development of a successor to the Fugaku supercomputer to achieve a more than 10-fold increase in the AI processing capacity of computers available to both the public and private sectors nationwide by fiscal 2030.

----

This article is from The Yomiuri Shimbun. Neither Dow Jones Newswires, MarketWatch, Barron's nor The Wall Street Journal were involved in the creation of this content.

YDN-M0000213679-1