Microsoft pours US$2.9b into AI and cloud in Japan: Nikkei
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The news: Microsoft will invest USD2.9 billion ($4.38 billion) toward expanding its cloud and AI infrastructure across Japan by 2025, according to a report from Nikkei.
The numbers: The tech giant’s investment marks the company’s largest in Japan to date, and will go towards the upskilling of three million workers in AI, as well as the establishment of a ‘Microsoft Research Asia Lab’ in Tokyo.
The context: Microsoft’s investment mirrors those of other server operators like Amazon and Google, which are keen to improve their infrastructure to support a global boom in AI applications and workloads.
Microsoft will also partner with the Japanese government to strengthen the country’s cybersecurity resilience, with the tech company’s president, Brad Smith, telling Nikkei: "The threat landscape for cybersecurity has become more challenging ... We're seeing that from China and from Russia in particular, but we're also seeing growing ransomware activity around the world." He added that "a close partnership between leading tech companies and the government" is one of the keys for protecting cyberspace.”
The announcement is expected to be made during Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s visit to the US this week and comes amid Tokyo’s push for more computing power for artificial intelligence, according to Nikkei.
