Toyota's Woven City project, located close to the foot of Japan's Mount Fuji, will complete Phase 1 of its development by the end of the year and start trials in 2025. The city will be used to pilot experiments and innovations in personal mobility, automated driving, robots, and artificial intelligence. It will have streets for automated driving, pedestrians, and pedestrians using personal mobility vehicles, as well as underground roads for goods transportation. The project will begin with around 350 residents, mainly senior citizens, families with young children, and inventors. It will help Toyota develop next-generation cars and realize a mobility society in which everyone can move freely.

Sakana AI creates state-of-the-art Japanese language, vision, and image generation models. It introduced an evolutionary model merge that aims to evolve foundation models without expensive pretraining. The model merge has been released along with an explanation of the method.

The trillion-dollar Government Pension Investment Fund of Japan is exploring alternative "illiquidity assets" such as Bitcoin for potential investment opportunities. This comes after Bitcoin's recent all-time high and a 130% surge in price over the past year. Although no commitment was made towards investing in cryptocurrencies, this inquiry suggests that the fund at least has some interest in digital assets.

OpenAI has opened an office in Japan. ChatGPT Enterprise is being adopted in Japan by businesses such as Daikin, Rakuten, and TOYOTA Connected. The Japanese government, focusing on AI policies for societal benefit, has collaborated to share ChatGPT best practices.

NVIDIA will power Japan's new quantum supercomputer, ABCI-Q, alongside Fujitsu, integrating 2,000 NVIDIA H100 AI GPUs and CUDA-Q platform for quantum-classical computing applications. The project aims to advance Japan's capabilities in quantum computing and AI. This collaboration is part of a broader technological partnership between NVIDIA and Japan.

Sakana AI's EvoSDXL-JP is a high-speed image generation model optimized for Japanese language prompts that utilizes an evolutionary model merging method. EvoSDXL-JP boasts tenfold faster inference speeds and superior performance compared to existing models. It is ideal for educational use in Japan to demonstrate the benefits of generative AI.

Japan's Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) has survived three lunar nights. SLIM was only designed to last until the end of its first lunar day. Some of its electronics and batteries were already malfunctioning after the second lunar night. The sensors and other functions in the lander are gradually being lost, so the chances of it surviving a fourth lunar night are slim.

Trials of the world's first tooth regrowth medicine are set to commence in September at Kyoto University Hospital. The researchers behind the medicine hope to start selling it in 2030. There have been no major side effects confirmed in animal studies to date. The medicine deactivates a protein called USAG-1, which inhibits the growth of teeth. The medicine is currently targeted at patients congenitally lacking a full set of teeth.

Laser-induced plasma displays ionize air molecules to create glowing points of light. Japanese researchers have created a laser plasma display that is safe to touch. It uses femtosecond lasers, which create a pulse duration so minuscule that it doesn't result in any appreciable skin damage unless fired at the same spot at one shot per millisecond for a duration of 2,000 milliseconds. Touching the plasma produces a physical sensation, as if the light has a physical substance. The displays are still very small, but researchers suggest that it is possible to scale them with different optical devices. A video explaining the system and showing holograms generated by the display being touched is available in the article.

Japanese company TDK claims it has made a material that provides an energy density of 1,000 watt-hours per liter, about 100 times greater than TDK's current batteries. The material will enable smaller device sizes and longer operating times. It offers a higher degree of stability and safety, but its fragility makes it impractical for use in cars or smartphones. TDK plans to start shipping samples of its new battery prototypes to clients next year before moving into mass production.

Perplexity is leveraging its strategic partnership with SoftBank to expand its reach in Japan. It is offering a free year of its premium AI-powered search engine, Perplexity Pro. SoftBank aims to attract users with AI services without developing in-house solutions. Perplexity, valued at $1 billion, is advancing its funding and investor base, which includes notable tech leaders and venture firms.

Sony is set to relaunch the Japanese cryptocurrency exchange Whalefin, which it acquired from Amber Group in 2023, marking its entry into the crypto market. Sony has begun engaging Web3, investing and incubating products with Astar Network mainly related to NFTs across gaming platforms.

Japan Railway's new humanoid robot employee is being put to use for maintenance work on the company's rail network. The 12-meter-high robot can carry objects as heavy as 40kg, hold a brush to paint, and use a chainsaw. Its current primary tasks are to trim tree branches along rails and paint the metal frames that hold cables above trains. The technology is aimed at filling worker shortages in the aging country as well as reducing worker accidents.

Laser Digital, a subsidiary of Nomura, has partnered with Dinero to launch an institutional liquid staking token fully backed by Dinero's pxETH called IpxETH. This product is designed for institutional investors seeking exposure to Ethereum staking yields, offering a unique alternative to spot Ether ETFs by providing staking benefits alongside ETH exposure.

Bitcoin hit its lowest price since February, and the rest of the market saw greater than 20% decreases in one of the biggest selloffs since FTX. Investors are reacting to several events, including Jump Crypto liquidating hundreds of millions of dollars of assets, the increasing chances of a Kamala Harris presidency, and a sharp decline in Japan's stock market. There are also fears about an impending recession, and ETHE investors are selling their positions in the Grayscale trust.

A small 25 basis point interest rate hike by the Bank of Japan triggered a massive sell-off in risk assets, including a sharp drop in Ethereum, due to the unwinding of the carry trade. This trade, where investors borrow cheap Yen to invest in higher-yield assets, is now collapsing as higher interest rates strengthen the Yen, forcing traders to sell assets to cover their more expensive Yen-denominated loans, leading to a cascade of liquidations.

Sakana, a Japanese AI firm, has released a system that can autonomously perform research by suggesting hypotheses, performing experiments, writing code, and summarizing the results in well-reasoned papers. The company has provided examples of the papers the system wrote along with an open sourced version of the system.

Intel failed to produce AI processors for SoftBank's Project Izanagi, leading SoftBank to explore a partnership with TSMC. Despite setbacks, SoftBank remains committed to challenging major AI players with its own hardware and data center ecosystem, potentially backed by significant investment from global partners. The move could strain SoftBank's relationship with Arm clients as it risks direct competition.

OpenAI's GPT Next will be trained with approximately 100x the compute load of GPT-4. It will be released later this year. The true estimates suggest some of the compute load changes are also due to algorithmic improvements. The article is in Japanese.

The raise will allow Sakana to continue growing its compute capabilities, hire more researchers, and generally become a leading AI lab in Japan.

The Tokyo Toilet is a project in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward comprising 17 unique public restrooms designed by 16 global creatives. Among these is the "Transparent Toilet" in Yoyogi Fukamachi Kokoen, designed by Shigeru Ban, which transforms from see-through to opaque when locked, ensuring privacy. While some users have noted issues with the glass becoming opaque more slowly in colder weather, this has become a must-visit spot for tourists intrigued by cutting-edge bathroom design.

MUFG, SMBC, and Mizuho, the megabanks of Japan, are piloting a cross-border stablecoin transfer platform. The initiative, “Project Pax,” will use stablecoins issued by bank-backed Progmat and run by Datachain and TOKI. It will use SWIFT's existing APIs to settle on blockchain networks and be commercialized by 2025.

Sony Bank is planning to launch a Stable Yen on Sony's upcoming L2, Soneium. The experimental process to determine its legal status will last several months. The project's goal is to make money transfers faster and cheaper.

Nintendo, a renowned Japanese company, has evolved significantly since its inception in 1889, transitioning from a playing card manufacturer to a global gaming powerhouse. Founded by Fusajiro Yamauchi in Kyoto, Nintendo initially focused on handmade hanafuda cards. The company entered the electronic gaming market in the 1970s, marking a pivotal shift that would shape the future of the gaming industry. The launch of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1985, along with iconic games like Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda, solidified Nintendo's status as a leader in video gaming. The evolution of Nintendo's logo reflects its journey and growth. The first logo, used from 1889 to 1950, featured traditional kanji characters and a color scheme of blue and red, symbolizing joy and trust. In 1951, the company rebranded as Nintendo Playing Card Co., Ltd., introducing the 'Ace of Spades' logo, which marked a shift towards the Latin alphabet, indicating a desire to reach Western markets. Throughout the 1960s, Nintendo experimented with various logo designs, including a handwritten cursive style and a clearer, sleeker version that reintroduced red. The 'NG' logo emerged during this time, representing Nippon Game, used for board games and later adopted for Nintendo's own products. By the late 1960s, Nintendo established a logo that closely resembles the one recognized today. This iteration, first seen in 1967, featured bold letters and a square dot on the 'i', becoming a staple of the brand. The 1970s saw further refinements, including a curvy 'N' logo for board games aimed at the U.S. and European markets. The racetrack logo, introduced in 1982, became a cornerstone of Nintendo's branding. This design, characterized by a rounded rectangle enclosing the word 'Nintendo' in a bold sans-serif font, symbolized speed and modernity. It has remained largely unchanged, adapting only slightly to contemporary design trends while maintaining its iconic status. Nintendo's logo evolution illustrates the company's commitment to innovation and adaptation, reflecting its journey from a traditional card maker to a leader in the gaming industry. The logo's transformations not only signify changes in design but also mirror Nintendo's strategic shifts and its enduring legacy in the world of entertainment.

Metaplanet, a Japanese firm, has recently expanded its Bitcoin holdings by acquiring an additional 107 BTC, bringing its total to over 500 BTC. This latest purchase, valued at approximately $6.9 million, was made at an average price of $64,168 per Bitcoin. The acquisition was financed through a loan from MMXX Ventures, a shareholder based in the British Virgin Islands. This strategic move is part of Metaplanet's broader strategy to use Bitcoin as a reserve asset to mitigate risks associated with the volatility of the Japanese yen and the country's debt situation. Since initiating its Bitcoin investments in April, Metaplanet has seen a remarkable increase in its stock price, which has surged by 420%. The firm began its Bitcoin journey with an initial purchase of 117.7 BTC, valued at around $7.19 million at that time. The average price for the Bitcoin it now holds is approximately $64,931. This significant investment has positioned Metaplanet as the largest holder of Bitcoin among publicly traded companies in Asia, following Hong Kong-based Meitu. The company's stock price has benefited from its Bitcoin strategy, achieving a market capitalization to holdings ratio of 20%, which is among the highest in the market. Despite a slight decline in Bitcoin's value of about 3% during the same period, the increase in the company's share price reflects the positive impact of its Bitcoin investments on shareholder value. Metaplanet's approach highlights a growing trend among companies looking to leverage cryptocurrency as a hedge against economic uncertainties, particularly in regions facing currency volatility. The firm’s strategic decisions underscore the evolving landscape of corporate investment in digital assets, as more companies recognize the potential benefits of incorporating Bitcoin into their financial strategies.