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Google's vow to not use AI for weapons or surveillance have been removed from its guidelines.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 5, 2025

Google pledge against using AI for weapons vanishes

The revised principles were posted just weeks after Google chief executive Sundar Pichai attended the inauguration of U.S. President Donald Trump.
Toyota is investing in increased capacity for electric vehicles and has unveiled plans to establish a subsidiary in Shanghai.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 5, 2025

Toyota raises annual profit guidance despite quarterly income drop

The automaker now expects a profit of ¥4.7 trillion ($31 billion) for the fiscal year ending March, up from its previous forecast of ¥4.3 trillion.
Panasonic will restructure low-growth businesses and make changes to its employment structure, according to a recently released statement.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 5, 2025

Panasonic shares jump most in 11 years on restructuring plans

The Osaka-based company will restructure low-growth businesses and make changes to its employment structure.
The new generative AI-powered Alexa represents at once a huge opportunity for Amazon, which counts more than half a billion Alexa-enabled devices in the market, and a tremendous risk.
BUSINESS / Tech
Feb 6, 2025

Amazon set to release long-delayed Alexa generative AI revamp

The new generative AI-powered Alexa represents at once a huge opportunity for Amazon.
Kuaishou Technology has attracted tens of millions of younger viewers who habitually scroll screens for new stories and trending videos.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 6, 2025

Mini dramas have supplanted movies in China. Is the U.S. next?

Professionally produced series for the web, mini dramas have clear storylines and big cliffhangers, with episodes running just 60 to 90 seconds each.
"The short-term interest rate should be at the 1% level by the second half of fiscal 2025,” up from the current 0.5%, the Bank of Japan’s most hawkish board member Naoki Tamura said Thursday in a speech to local business leaders in Nagano Prefecture.
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 6, 2025

BOJ’s Tamura says interest rate needs to rise to at least 1%

A speech by the board member is likely to further fuel market speculation that more rate hikes are in the pipeline.
Tokyo Electron, one of a handful of key chip gear-makers globally, revealed expansion plans after posting better-than-expected earnings.
BUSINESS
Feb 6, 2025

Tokyo Electron plans expansion despite AI spending doubts

The company, one of a handful of key chip gear-makers globally, revealed the expansion after posting better-than-expected earnings.
Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma will be acquired by U.S. private equity firm Bain Capital for ¥510 billion.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 9, 2025

Bain to acquire Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma in $3.3 billion deal

Tanabe Pharma focuses on therapeutic areas such as immunology and inflammation, vaccines, diabetes, and central nervous system and metabolic disease.
Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance will acquire Banner Life Insurance in the United States as it seeks to expand its business overseas amid sluggish domestic market.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 9, 2025

Meiji Yasuda to acquire U.S. peer Banner Life

Japanese life insurance companies are expanding overseas for growth as the domestic market shrinks.
The three megabank groups including Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group posted record consolidated net profits in April-December 2024.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 9, 2025

Japan firms to log record profits — driven by finance and AI biz

Leading the growth is the financial sector, buoyed by the return of positive interest rates to Japan thanks to the Bank of Japan's rate hikes
Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida (left) and Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe during a news conference in December
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 10, 2025

Honda and Nissan results will highlight flaws as deal set to fail

The likely fallout of Honda’s short-lived alliance with Nissan spells trouble for both companies, but probably one more than the other.
The Auckland city skyline in 2021
BUSINESS
Feb 10, 2025

New Zealand changes ‘golden visa’ to lure wealthy migrants

As well as dropping the English language test, other potential barriers to investment such as the amount of time investors must stay in the country will be adjusted.
Construction for a new Microsoft data center in East Wenatchee, Washington, in November 2024.
BUSINESS / Tech
Feb 10, 2025

What DeepSeek? Big Tech keeps its AI building boom alive.

After DeepSeek’s breakthrough rattled markets, U.S. tech giants doubled down on massive data center investments to stay ahead in AI.
Capital gains on direct Bitcoin purchases are subject to taxes of up to 55% in Japan, making investing in stock proxies like Metaplanet via the Nippon Individual Savings Account program a cheap and convenient option for small-scale and first-time buyers.
BUSINESS / Markets
Feb 10, 2025

Bitcoin hoarder’s stock soars 4,000% in Japan on crypto rally

Shares of Metaplanet are up more than 4,000% over the past 12 months, the largest gain among all Japanese equities in that period.
On Sunday, U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters that U.S. Steel would remain American.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 10, 2025

Nippon Steel goes quiet after U.S. Steel deal seemingly nixed for good

Comments over the weekend by U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba point to the U.S. steelmaker remaining American.
French President Emmanuel Macron speaks during the AI Action Summit in Paris on Monday.
BUSINESS / Tech
Feb 11, 2025

France and EU promise to cut red tape on artificial intelligence technology

European lawmakers last year approved the bloc's artificial intelligence law, the world's first comprehensive set of rules governing the technology.
The Tesla gigafactory in Austin, Texas. Nothing in Texas law would stop Tesla from launching a robotaxi service.
BUSINESS / Tech
Feb 11, 2025

Tesla robotaxis by June? Musk turns to Texas for hands-off regulation

Nothing in Texas law would stop Tesla from launching a robotaxi service.
A Good me tea store, operated by Guming Holdings Ltd., in Chongqing, China, on Saturday. The tea chain's shares began trading in Hong Kong on Wednesday.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 12, 2025

Hong Kong’s latest bubble tea IPO mints another billionaire

Guming Holdings' IPO has made founder Yun’an Wang a billionaire as China’s bubble tea market continues its rapid expansion.
Fredric Gushin, president and CEO of Spectrum Gaming Group
BUSINESS
Feb 12, 2025

Thailand's big casino gamble hangs on fine print of regulations

Experts warn success will come only by playing its cards right on regulation.
A Nissan Motor X-Trail vehicle at the company's showroom in Tokyo's Ginza district
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 12, 2025

Foxconn signals interest in buying Renault's stake in Nissan

The company has approached both Renault and Nissan about potential cooperation.
Cargo ships full of shipping containers are seen at the port of Oakland, California, on Feb. 3 as trade tensions escalate over U.S. tariffs
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 13, 2025

Trump says he will sign reciprocal tariffs order soon, as trade war fears mount

Trump's latest round of market-rattling tariffs comes as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is due to visit the White House on Thursday.
Sony has prioritized acquiring more content and intellectual property rights at a time when the company’s hardware efforts are stagnating.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 13, 2025

Sony lifts forecast on expectations of game and music improvement

Sony has prioritized acquiring more content and intellectual property rights at a time when the company’s hardware efforts are stagnating.
This is the 12th straight year that labor unions of major electronics firms have demanded pay scale hikes.
BUSINESS
Feb 13, 2025

Japan electronics unions demand wage hike of ¥17,000

The focus is on whether employers will agree to raise pay significantly as in recent years to ensure that wages rise faster than prices.
A special police member monitors a protest, while inside the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) building, a day after members of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) led by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk moved into the CFPB, in Washington last Saturday.
BUSINESS / Markets
Feb 14, 2025

Rapid unraveling of U.S. consumer watchdog leaves financial firms in limbo

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau may be reviled by the industry, but its abrupt undoing is causing upheaval among those it regulates.
TikTok had more than 52 million downloads in 2024, according to Sensor Tower.
BUSINESS / Tech
Feb 14, 2025

TikTok returns on Apple and Google U.S. app stores as Trump delays ban

TikTok is back in U.S. app stores after Trump delayed a ban and assured Apple and Google they wouldn’t be penalized.
The U.S. Steel Mon Valley Works Edgar Thomson Plant in Braddock, Pennsylvania.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 14, 2025

Nippon Steel wants 100% of U.S. Steel, not a minority stake, report says

Last week, the deal appeared effectively dead after a meeting between Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and U.S. President Donald Trump.
Sydney-based Minotaur Capital outperformed the global stock market in its first six months while slashing research costs by using AI.
BUSINESS / Markets
Feb 14, 2025

Hedge fund startup that replaced analysts with AI beats the market

Minotaur Capital, which has no analysts on staff, returned 13.7% in the six months ending January versus 6.7% for the MSCI All-Country World Index.
Bain Capital said in a statement on Monday that it won’t implement a tender offer for Fuji Soft after deciding not to increase the price.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 17, 2025

Bain ends tussle with KKR for Fuji Soft by giving up bid

The public battle underscored how quickly the private equity landscape has been changing in Japan.
Japan’s robo-adviser market, estimated to be worth around ¥3 trillion, has massive room for growth, says the CEO of robo-adviser Folio Holdings.
BUSINESS
Feb 18, 2025

SBI-backed Japan robo-adviser Folio targets swing to profit and IPO

Japan’s robo-adviser market is estimated to be worth around $19.8 billion.
The Grok-3 artificial intelligence chatbot has "more than 10 times” the computing power of its predecessor, billionaire Elon Musk said in a presentation alongside three engineers from xAI, his AI startup, on Monday.
BUSINESS / Tech
Feb 18, 2025

Musk debuts Grok-3 AI chatbot to rival OpenAI and DeepSeek

Grok-3 beats its rivals across math, science and coding benchmarks, the chatbot's developer says.

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years