Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Former minister Karen Makishima will discuss how Japan’s Digital Agency is spearheading the country’s digital transformation and what challenges might lie ahead.
Japan's venture capital industry has grown to unprecedented prominence. Fueled by increasing social legitimacy and support from the Kishida administration, Japan's venture capital is poised to drive the startup ecosystem to the next level.
To understand how Japan’s economy changes over time, it is important to differentiate the traditional, new, and hybrid parts that coexist—observers who look at only the traditional areas may conclude that very little has changed, while those more familiar with the new areas see rapid and extensive change.
Japan is determined to foster a startup economy. But every startup ecosystem is built on several components and a strategic conception of how they fit together. Cracking this puzzle will be Japan's challenge.
Japan's startup ecosystem, which grew as a relatively peripheral segment of Japan’s economy throughout much of its recent history, is now front and center in getting attention from the government and big business.
An underappreciated aspect of Abe Shinzo’s administration was in creating specific, forward-looking, actionable goals involving innovation, technology, and start-up ecosystems.
Japan and the United States would benefit immensely from cultivating closer ties between their startup ecosystems and other efforts to spur shared innovation.
A close look at the digital transformation of Japan in an era of global cloud computing.
Carnegie’s Kenji Kushida, World Innovation Lab’s Gen Isayama, and Komatsu’s Aki Tabata discuss how Japanese companies are harnessing the Silicon Valley ecosystem—and vice versa—for mutual benefit and how the U.S. and Japan can learn from these new relationships to enhance future collaboration.
Washington and Tokyo have committed to make technology collaboration a centerpiece of U.S.-Japan relations. But the critical step will be to enhance private sector–led innovation.