TYO:5406

Japan Taps SoftBank-Backed Noetra for AI Push Worth Up to 1 Trillion Yen

Japan's government has selected a SoftBank Corp.-backed (TYO:9434) consortium to lead a national effort to develop a homegrown artificial intelligence model, with total government investment poised to reach 1 trillion yen over five years.The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) named Noetra Inc. and the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) as the implementers of its "Multimodal Platform Model Development Project for AI Robots and Physical AI," according to a press release on Tuesday.It follows a review of 15 proposals submitted during a public tender that ran from March 24 to April 22.The project spans fiscal years 2026 through 2030, with contracts initially signed for the first two years and continuation subject to an annual stage-gate review, NEDO said.Under the arrangement, Noetra will develop and supply "an internationally competitive" multimodal platform model while taking into account the needs of Japanese model development and utilization.AIST will work with domestic and international research institutions to carry out advanced technological development and contribute to the development of what METI described as "a future-oriented, competitive platform model."The AI model is expected to handle a range of data, including language, audio, images, videos, sensor data, and more.The government has already earmarked 387.3 billion yen for the program in its fiscal 2026 budget, funded through GX Economy Transition Bonds, according to METI's budget outline published in April.Noetra is a joint project led by SoftBank Corp., the telecommunications and internet subsidiary of SoftBank Group (TYO:9984). It counts NEC Corp. (TYO:6701), Honda Motor (TYO:7267), Sony Group (TYO:6758), Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (TYO:8306), Sumitomo Mitsui Financial (TYO:8316), Mizuho Financial Group (TYO:8411), Nippon Steel (TYO:5401) and Kobe Steel (TYO:5406) as partners.Back in April, METI disclosed its ambition for Japan to capture 30%, or 20 trillion yen, of the global AI robotics market by 2040.The announcement comes amid a broader rally in Japanese AI-linked stocks that pushed the Nikkei 225 to its sharpest quarterly increase on record as of Tuesday. SoftBank Group recently overtook Toyota Motor (TYO:7203) as Japan's most valuable listed company.The Japanese initiative follows a similar push from neighboring South Korea, which also unveiled plans to build semiconductor facilities and AI data centers on Monday, enlisting chipmaker SK Hynix (KRX:000660), Samsung Electronics (KRX:005930) and internet firm Naver (KRX:035420).