Japan to Buy Nvidia Chips to Power Its AI Push — Update

By Yang Jie and Megumi Fujikawa

Nvidia chips are set to power Japan's artificial-intelligence push, with the government planning to buy thousands of the company's next-generation semiconductors to build an AI ecosystem on its own soil.

Backed by massive government funding, Japan's purchase of 27,500 Nvidia AI chips will fuel a computing hub slated to launch in 2028, according to an announcement made during Nvidia Chief Executive Jensen Huang's visit to Tokyo.

The infrastructure will support efforts by state-backed consortium Noetra to develop so-called physical AI--the technology that lets machines interact in the real world. It's all part of Tokyo's overarching plan to develop homegrown alternatives to foreign platforms.

Under the agreement, Nvidia will supply AI chips and computing infrastructure for foundational models to Noetra, an alliance spearheaded by SoftBank Group, Sony Group, Honda Motor and other Japanese industry titans.

"Japan cannot outsource its national intelligence," Huang said at an event in Tokyo. "Japan must own, improve, secure and deploy Japan AI."

Noetra plans to release an initial foundation model in fiscal 2026 that will gradually evolve to handle multimodal data like images and audio. By fiscal 2030, it aims to develop the system into an advanced "artificial brain" capable of understanding complex real-world environments, eventually enabling factory machines, robots and vehicles to make decisions on their own.

Japan is one of many countries rushing to invest in sovereign AI to secure technological independence and shield themselves from geopolitical vulnerabilities.

By hosting computing infrastructure locally and training models on domestic data, governments can safeguard highly sensitive information, protect critical infrastructure like energy grids from foreign interference, and power industries like robotics on their own terms.

"In the era of big data and AI, Japan's path to victory lies in leveraging its position as a super-aging society and a disaster-prone nation," said Japan's trade minister, Ryosei Akazawa, who attended Thursday's event wearing a black leather jacket like the one that has become Huang's trademark.

Japan has real-world data from its factories and extreme situations like the Fukushima nuclear cleanup, Akazawa said.

It is crucial to use big data and physical AI to tackle challenges like nuclear decommissioning, an aging population, natural disasters and labor shortages, while simultaneously driving Japan's economic growth, he added.

"As dependence on foreign technology remains a challenge in building AI domestically, it is highly encouraging to see the establishment of a development foundation for domestic physical AI models," Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said in a video message.

"Let's make this frontier project-creating reliable physical AI here in Japan and exporting it to the world-the banner for Japan's revitalization," she said.

--Sherry Qin contributed to this report

Write to Yang Jie at jie.yang@wsj.com and Megumi Fujikawa at megumi.fujikawa@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 16, 2026 07:21 ET (11:21 GMT)