President Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida have enlisted Amazon.com Inc. and Nvidia Corp. to fund a new joint artificial intelligence research program, as the two nations look to improve collaboration around the quickly emerging technology.
Nvidia, Amazon, Arm Holdings and Microsoft Corp. – along with a group of Japanese companies – will provide $110 million for AI research partnerships between the University of Washington in Seattle and Tsukuba University outside Tokyo and between Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and Tokyo’s Keio University, the two leaders said in a joint statement following their summit in Washington on Wednesday.
The push for greater research into artificial intelligence comes as the Biden administration is weighing a series of new regulations designed to minimize the risks of AI technology, which has developed as a key focus for tech companies. The White House announced late last month that federal agencies have until the end of the year to determine how they will assess, test, and monitor the impact of government use of AI technology.
The university-led initiatives come in addition to a $2.9 billion investment from Microsoft announced Tuesday that would boost the company’s artificial intelligence and cloud computing infrastructure in Japan. Kishida met Tuesday with Microsoft President Brad Smith and the company said in a statement it plans to open a new lab in Japan focused on AI and robotics.
In the joint statement, Biden and Kishida also confirmed bilateral cooperation on semiconductors. With nearly $800 billion in direct investment, Japan tops the list of foreign investors in the U.S., according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.
Japanese companies employ nearly 1 million Americans, according to the statement, which touted Toyota Motor Corp’s recent additional $8 billion battery production investment in North Carolina. Kishida is scheduled to visit Toyota’s battery plant in the state Friday
On Tuesday, Kishida urged American business executives to increase investment in emerging technologies in Japan, Asia’s second-largest economy.
“Your investments will enable Japan’s economic growth – which will also be capital for more investments from Japan to the U.S.,” Kishida said at a roundtable with business leaders in Washington.
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