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July 12, 2026
 

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AI

Japan's internal affairs industry may introduce artificial intelligence agents at local governments facing labor shortages.
JAPAN
Jul 11, 2026
Japan weighing AI agents for understaffed local governments
A study group will compile an interim report by the end of fiscal 2026 and aim to release its final report around summer 2027.
Chey Tae-won, chairman of SK Group (center), and Kwak Noh-jung, president and CEO of SK Hynix (center left), and Koh Seung-beom, chairman of SK Hynix Inc. (center right), ring the opening bell during the company's initial public offering at the Nasdaq MarketSite in New York on Friday.
BUSINESS / Tech / FOCUS
Jul 11, 2026
SK Hynix debut is a bet that AI breaks boom-and-bust chip cycle
South Korean memory chipmaker SK Hynix just pulled off the largest public listing by a foreign company in U.S. market history.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaks during the Microsoft Build conference at the Seattle Convention Center Summit Building in Seattle in May 2024.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jul 11, 2026
Apple sues OpenAI for trade secret theft in pivotal case
The iPhone maker said in a suit Friday that OpenAI encouraged Apple employees to share information, components, drawings and other materials related to upcoming products.
Since their listing in 2024, Kioxia’s shares have surged on runaway demand for AI memory chips.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 9, 2026
Bain Capital exits Kioxia after chip deal yields big returns
A global spending spree on AI catapulted Kioxia’s shares more than 4,800% from their debut, transforming the chipmaker into one of Japan’s most valuable companies.
China had previously restricted the import of Nvidia's H200 chips on concerns that a flood of American-designed AI processors would hinder the government’s long-held goal of developing an indigenous chip industry.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jul 9, 2026
Beijing to let Chinese AI companies buy Nvidia H200 chips
The companies need to say how many chips they need — and why — to get approval.
Goldman Sachs Group has vaulted past Wall Street rivals to become the top global player in Taiwan’s equity trading market, capitalizing on surging demand from quant funds for artificial intelligence.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jul 9, 2026
Goldman becomes Taiwan’s top foreign broker on AI quant push
The Wall Street bank has risen from 10th place in early 2025 to become Taiwan’s largest foreign brokerage by trading volume in the first half.
Governments letting AI run much of their operations risk repeating past algorithm-driven failures by scaling errors, reducing transparency and undermining accountability for citizens.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 8, 2026
Beware of government by AI
That is a danger we must not ignore. We already know what happens when governments delegate decision-making to algorithms.
An American soldier demonstrates how to fly a drone during a training exercise at a U.S. military facility in Hohenfels, Germany, on April 30.
COMMENTARY
Jul 8, 2026
America’s battlefield dominance is under serious threat
The U.S. still possesses the most capable military, but its ability to dominate a battlefield is under threat due to the rapid evolution of warfare.
DeepSeek is designing its own chip for inference, the stage of artificial intelligence computing in which a trained model generates responses for users, ​sources said.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jul 8, 2026
China’s DeepSeek developing its own AI chip, sources say
If successful, DeepSeek’s expansion into semiconductor development would mark a major strategic shift for a company widely hailed in China as the country’s AI ‌champion.
Sudanese women gather for a hot meal in al-Rahmaniyah camp for displaced people, near the city of El-Obeid in the southern Kordofan region of Sudan on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Jul 8, 2026
Misinformation inciting harm to refugees, UNHCR says
Artificial intelligence is exacerbating the spread of such misinformation and hate speech, according to the U.N. refugee agency.
KDDI and KDDI SmartDrone will study the potential use of AI drones for disaster prevention and for patrolling and inspecting infrastructure facilities.
BUSINESS
Jul 7, 2026
KDDI to conduct AI drone feasibility study in Vietnam and the Philippines
KDDI and KDDI SmartDrone will study the potential use of AI drones for disaster prevention and for patrolling and inspecting infrastructure facilities.
Liu Debing, chairman of Knowledge Atlas Technology, better known as Zhipu, attends the Chinese generative-AI startup's listing ceremony at the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on Thursday, Jan. 8.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 7, 2026
A China shock is shaking Silicon Valley
One thing has become clear: Open models from China now pose one of the biggest existential threats to the U.S. AI establishment.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara (third from left) speaks at a meeting of the digital administrative and fiscal reform council, held at the Prime Minister's Office in Tokyo on Tuesday.
JAPAN
Jul 7, 2026
Japan to launch council to overhaul legal frameworks governing AI use
The government is seeking to advance what is described as AI transformation, or a fundamental review of work using AI, to cope with population decline.
Samsung reported preliminary operating income of 89.4 trillion South Korean won ($58 billion) in the three months through June, dwarfing its performance for all of 2025.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jul 7, 2026
Samsung’s soaring profit fails to lift shares after AI rally
Samsung’s shares have underperformed rival those of SK Hynix, which is more focused on high-end memory geared for AI’s computation needs.
Workers transport soil containing rare earth elements for export at a port in Lianyungang, in China's Jiangsu province. China dominates the global market for rare earths and it is using those supplies as a diplomatic cudgel.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jul 7, 2026
Corporate Japan’s rare-earth warnings get louder as China keeps spigot closed
As the economy strengthens, an unprecedented increase in company notices about critical ​minerals is flashing a warning signal for the quarters ahead.
Reliant on Nvidia hardware for AI training and inferencing since its outset, Turing now handles roughly 10% of its AI training needs with Advanced Micro Devices graphics processing units.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 6, 2026
Self-driving startup Turing gets AMD backing and adopts AMD GPUs
The five-year-old Japanese startup is adding to its capabilities as it builds toward a commercial launch.
Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi attends an annual training session near Mount Fuji at Higashifuji Training Field in Gotemba, Shizuoka Prefecture, on June 7.
JAPAN / FOCUS
Jul 5, 2026
‘Defense,’ not ‘warfare,’ stressed as pacifist Japan beefs up capabilities
The move is seen as at least partially aimed at winning public support for boosting the country’s defense capabilities.
Sharp is targeting ¥300 billion in new business sales by fiscal 2030
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 4, 2026
Sharp targets ¥300 billion new business sales by fiscal 2030
Sharp also plans to expand its satellite communications equipment business, including compact antennas.
Haruki Murakami's first book in three years hit shelves in Japan on Friday.
CULTURE / Books
Jul 3, 2026
Murakami says his novels are ‘different’ from AI literature
When he is deeply focused on writing a story, characters suddenly show up, and “that’s not something that comes out from analogy,” he said, adding “AI probably can’t do that.”
Hiroo Ota (center left), CEO of Kioxia Holdings, and others unveil Kioxia's new 3D flash memory chip at its Kitakami plant in Kitakami, Iwate Prefecture, on Friday.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 3, 2026
Kioxia ships samples of new flash memory for AI data centers
The Tokyo-based chipmaker’s latest high-density 3D flash memory chips aim to better meet AI data center needs with better efficiency and transmission speeds.
China’s demand for Soviet-style apartments shows limits to revival
Apartments built during a Soviet Union-inspired construction drive in the 1970s and 1980s tend to suffer from poor insulation and outdated plumbing, but they are seeing a revival in interest due to their attractive locations.
Japanese scientists identify neural mechanism that may explain why we dislike people
The aggressive mouse (left) used in the experiment and a mouse defending itself
Japanese payment processor’s collapse hits banks and restaurants
Zentoshin served around 200,000 shops, many of which rely on early payments to maintain cash flow, raising concerns over their financial stability following the disruption.
Over 70% of accommodations in Japan say they are understaffed amid tourism influx
The number of foreign visitors to Japan reached a high of 42.68 million in 2025.
Lenders seek $700 million after Japanese payments firm’s collapse
The financial failure of Osaka-based Zentoshin has left 63 creditors with claims totaling ¥115.16 billion, according to Tokyo Shoko Research.
Japan’s largest exhibition of women photographers rights a wrong in cultural history
Miwa Yanagi’s “Elevator Girl House” series skewers the superficiality of gender roles through staged images.
Over 70% of accommodations in Japan say they are understaffed amid tourism influx
The number of foreign visitors to Japan reached a high of 42.68 million in 2025.
‘Princess Mononoke’ comes alive in Super Kabuki staging
The “Princess Mononoke” adaptation was created under Shochiku’s Super Kabuki initiative, a modern form of kabuki with more technology in staging and open to pop culture collaborations.
The beating heart inside ‘Human Vapor’
Different forms of love and connection form the emotional backbone of Netflix’s “Human Vapor,” says actor Shun Oguri, who plays troubled detective Kenji Okamoto.
Japan bets on character IP to drive global growth
Born on social media platforms in 2022, Opanchu Usagi has become a major hit, especially among Generation Z.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

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The Terasaka Rice Terraces are seen with Mount Buko in the background.
What Yokoze can teach Japan about rural revival
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