Kawasaki Heavy Industries is collaborating with companies including Nvidia to integrate AI and robotics, and last month announced a development hub in Silicon Valley. Kawasaki Heavy Industries is finalizing plans to raise about ¥200 billion ($1.23 billion) by issuing new shares and convertible bonds to fund capital expenditure, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The company will decide on the details of the issuance as soon as this week, the sources said. The shares and convertible bonds will be sold mainly to overseas institutional investors, one of the sources said. The plan to raise funds has not been reported earlier. Kawasaki Heavy said in a statement that it is considering various capital strategies including issuing new shares and bonds but that nothing has been decided.

The industry ministry announced ¥387.3 billion in funding to develop a domestic foundation model for physical AI that controls robots, aiming to strengthen the country's competitiveness against the United States and China. The industry ministry said Tuesday that it would provide ¥387.3 billion in aid for a project to develop a domestic model that serves as the foundation of a physical artificial intelligence system that controls robots. The ministry aims to make the multimodal foundation model widely available to Japanese companies to help the country catch up with the United States and China in the technology. The project is led by Noetra, a Japanese company founded by firms including telecommunications operator SoftBank, to develop AI models domestically. Engineers from SoftBank and Japanese AI startup Preferred Networks will join the project.

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman attend an event in Tokyo in February 2025. SoftBank's investment gain on OpenAI stood at an estimated $19.8 billion as of December. SoftBank Group sprang back to a quarterly profit after Masayoshi Son's bet on OpenAI paid off in valuation gains, cementing the Japanese company's position as an investment proxy for the ChatGPT creator. The Tokyo-based company has invested more than $30 billion (¥4.58 trillion) in OpenAI, accumulating an 11% stake as of December, and has been in talks to invest as much as $30 billion more in a round that would value the startup at about $750 billion to $830 billion. As of December, SoftBank's investment gain on OpenAI stood at an estimated $19.8 billion, the company said Thursday.

SoftBank shares have plunged around 40% since late October as it sits at the forefront of a global AI selloff. Growing unease over frothy artificial intelligence valuations is weighing on shares of SoftBank Group, which traders increasingly view as a proxy for privately held OpenAI. The Japanese tech investor sits at the forefront of a global AI selloff amid worries about new pressure on OpenAI following Alphabet's Gemini 3.0 debut. SoftBank shares have plunged around 40% since late October, erasing over ¥16 trillion ($102 billion) in market value, as its founder Masayoshi Son prepares to double down on OpenAI and the infrastructure that supports it. SoftBank has ridden the global AI investment boom faster than any other Japanese company.

Like everyone, I have come to massively resent the insidious creep of subscription services. I started off with an affordable, shareable Netflix subscription, many years ago. Then came Spotify, then Disney when I had children, then Prime Video, all of which I could just about justify. Then my Fitbit started wanting to charge me to unlock features in a device I'd already bought. Google now charges me monthly to store in the cloud the photos I take on my Google phone.

Shin-Etsu Chemical said Tuesday that it will build a new semiconductor materials plant in the city of Isesaki, Gunma Prefecture, at a cost of some 83 billion. The plant, slated to be completed by 2026, will make photoresists, including extreme ultraviolet resists used for state-of-the-art chips for generative artificial intelligence systems, and other semiconductor-related materials. The investment includes the cost to buy a 150,000-square-meter site for the factory. It will be the Japanese company's first new domestic production base since its plant in the city of Kamisu, Ibaraki Prefecture, was built in 1970. The Isesaki plant will also carry out research and development in the future. Currently, the company makes photoresists and related products at its plants in the prefectures of Niigata and Fukui, both along the Sea of Japan, and in Taiwan.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- A Tokyo company aimed for the moon with its own private lander Sunday, blasting off atop a SpaceX rocket with the United Arab Emirates' first lunar rover and a toylike robot from Japan that's designed to roll around up there in the gray dust. It will take nearly five months for the lander and its experiments to reach the moon. The company ispace designed its craft to use minimal fuel to save money and leave more room for cargo. By contrast, NASA's Orion crew capsule with test dummies took five days to reach the moon last month. The lunar flyby mission ends Sunday with a Pacific splashdown.

Ibiden and TSMC did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Fox Business Flash top headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on FoxBusiness.com. TOKYO - Japanese companies are ramping up the use of artificial intelligence and other advanced technology to reduce waste and cut costs in the pandemic, and looking to score some sustainability points along the way. Disposing of Japan's more than 6 million tonnes in food waste costs the world's No.3 economy some 2 trillion yen ($19 billion) a year, government data shows. With the highest food waste per capita in Asia, the Japanese government has enacted a new law to halve such costs from 2000 levels by 2030, pushing companies to find solutions.

Sony Corp.'s PlayStation 5 video game console went on sale Thursday, a key test of the company's ability to sustain its biggest growth engine during a coronavirus-era gaming boom. The new PlayStation is Sony's most important gadget since the Walkman, and it goes head-to-head with Microsoft Corp.'s next-generation Xbox over the holidays. The PlayStation 5 is anchored by the new Spider-Man game. Both consoles have chalked up solid sales since initial orders started in September, straining supplies. The ¥49,980 PlayStation 5 -- a version without an optical drive goes for ¥39,980 -- marks a watershed moment for a company once synonymous with music players and Trinitron TVs.