NVIDIA AI Day Tokyo: Japan’s AI Demand Set to Soar 320x by 2030

At NVIDIA AI Day Tokyo, over 900 attendees gathered to explore the future of artificial intelligence and Japan’s vision for sovereign AI. The highlight: a bold prediction that Japan’s demand for AI computing power will rise 320 times by 2030 compared to 2020.

Sovereign AI and National Strategy

Kuniyoshi Suzuki, senior director at SoftBank Corp., emphasized the need for domestic AI technologies. He called for Japan-made large language models (LLMs) and local computing infrastructure to ensure safe and transparent AI adoption.

The Japanese government has already committed 10 trillion yen (around $65 billion) to boost AI and semiconductor industries by 2030, putting AI at the heart of its national growth strategy.

“Specialized AI for industries like manufacturing, finance and healthcare will drive Japan’s digital transformation,” said Kazuya Ishikawa of NEC.

Industry in Motion

Several Japanese companies showcased cutting-edge projects:

  • Stockmark unveiled a 100-billion-parameter Japanese LLM as an NVIDIA NIM microservice, delivering faster inference.
  • FastLabel launched FastLabel Data Curation, a solution for autonomous driving and ADAS.
  • Hakuhodo Technologies plans to use NVIDIA AI Blueprints and NeMo Agent Toolkit to create AI-driven advertising.
  • Shimizu Corporation is piloting AI tools for video search and site monitoring in construction.

NVIDIA also introduced Nemotron-Personas-Japan, the first synthetic dataset aligned with Japan’s cultural and demographic landscape — designed to power sovereign AI without exposing personal data.

Focus on Agentic and Physical AI

Workshops and sessions explored agentic AI (autonomous digital workers capable of reasoning and collaboration) and physical AI, which enables robots, vehicles, and devices to act in the real world.

Highlights included:

  • NVIDIA Omniverse for digital twins.
  • Isaac GR00T for humanoid robotics.
  • NVIDIA Cosmos foundation models for physical AI.

Healthcare also got a spotlight, with deep dives into MONAI, Holoscan, and Isaac for Healthcare platforms driving next-generation medtech.

What’s Next

Japan’s AI ecosystem is rapidly maturing, blending agentic digital workers with physical AI systems to fuel the next industrial revolution. With sovereign AI at its core, Japan aims to remain competitive, secure, and innovative in the global AI race.

The next stop on the global NVIDIA AI Day tour: Sydney, October 15–16.