Japanese tech conglomerate SoftBank is looking to develop a “world-class” Japanese-language-specific generative artificial intelligence model, and plans to invest $960 million in the next two years to bolster its computing facilities, according to a Nikkei report. 

Training of large language models (LLM), such as OpenAI’s Chat GPT, requires advanced graphics processing units, which SoftBank plans to purchase from U.S. chip giant Nvidia, the Nikkei reported Monday, citing anonymous sources. 

The investment of 150 billion yen ($960 million) will be spent in 2024 and 2025 and adds to 20 billion yen that SoftBank spent on computing infrastructure last year, the report said.

The latest investment is believed to be the largest of its kind by any Japanese company, and when completed, will likely give SoftBank the most powerful computing capabilities in the country, Nikkei added.

According to another report from Nikkei Asia, Japan lacks private companies with the high-performance supercomputers that are needed to build LLM, despite increased interest in the tech.

SoftBank’s reported investments could change this and give Japan a strong domestic player in its generative AI space at a time when international players are trying to enter the market.

Just last week, OpenAI opened its first office in Tokyo as part of its global expansion plans. Meanwhile, Microsoft said it would invest $2.9 billion over two years to increase its cloud computing and AI infrastructure in the country.

In fiscal year 2024, SoftBank expects to complete its first model, which will have 390 billion parameters, an indication of LLM complexity. It will also start developing a higher-performance model with 1 trillion parameters as soon as 2025, according to Nikkei.

Other local players like Japanese telecommunications company NTT have announced plans to develop an LLM this fiscal year. NTT says it will also invest 8 trillion yen ($51.7 billion) into growth areas like data centers and AI over the next five years.

According to data from Statista Market Insights, Japan’s AI market is expected to grow to around $13 billion by 2030, about 17 times larger than in 2023.

SoftBank’s stock price has trended positively as the company shifts its focus to AI, and is up by about 20% year-to-date. It is also the majority owner of the chip company Arm, which has experienced a boost in sales expectations amid the AI boom.

SoftBank is reportedly working on building AI data centers across Japan and recently joined a project to build a 65 billion yen center in Hokkaido.

Read the full report on Nikkei Asia.

BEIJING — Chinese video streaming platform iQiyi is turning its attention to the country’s aging population, while using artificial intelligence tools to bolster content production.

One of iQiyi’s near-term goals is to improve the product offering for older users, CEO and founder Gong Yu said Tuesday at the company’s annual conference.

“It seems simple but it’s not, because in the past 10, 20 years the motto has been to serve young people, and not be traditional,” he said in Mandarin, translated by CNBC.

He noted how users in their 40s or older are dropping off because increased screen time is accelerating eyesight deterioration, and it’s harder for them to read small text. Gong also pointed to estimates that predict about one-fourth of China’s population will be considered elderly in 2033, rising to one-third in 2053.

China is rapidly aging as fewer people have children and lifespans increase. Births have fallen despite Beijing’s efforts in the last decade to unwind restrictions on households for one child each.

Fewer children, Gong said, means each child becomes more important. He said iQiyi would improve the quality of its content for children.

IQiyi is also tapping artificial intelligence tools for making content production more efficient.

Liu Wenfeng, iQiyi’s chief technology officer, gave a speech at the Tuesday conference about “embracing AI.” He showed off the company’s tools for quickly imitating a multi-camera shot in a virtual environment, and described how the virtually created elements from clothes to buildings could be re-used or commercialized in a future metaverse.

Liu also said iQiyi’s AI tools can significantly reduce the time spent analyzing novels for production-worthy stories, as well as detect which parts of existing dramas bore or interest viewers.

Tuesday morning’s presentations included a clip from OpenAI’s Sora text-to-video promotional video, but iQiyi executives did not share whether they had similar technology at scale.

Instead, Liu emphasized how generative AI allows more people to be creators, and that the scarcest attribute would then be excellent creativity and superior aesthetics.

IQiyi cannot publicly share more details about its AI capabilities due to confidentiality, but creators who partner with the company can learn more, founder Gong said.

Looking ahead, he said the company would also look to tap opportunities in overseas markets as growth in China moderates.

IQiyi in late February reported it swung to a profit in 2023 for the first time since it listed in the U.S. in 2018. For nearly every year since, the company posted annual losses of $1 billion or more.

The company is next due to release quarterly results on May 16.

In late February, iQiyi CFO Wang Jun told CNBC in an exclusive interview he is “excited” about potential new business opportunities with the emergence of OpenAI’s text-to-video tool Sora.

He said such tools can help iQiyi tell stories more creatively, and that internally, it is exploring the text-to-video space though it is not working with Sora.

For 2023, iQiyi said its original content accounted for a record 65% of major dramas it released.

The company claims it now has more than 50 in-house studios that produce more than 200 shows a year.

The growth of in-house production reflects a bigger change in China’s film industry over the last five years, Wang said, noting that previously the majority of content was made by third parties, resulting in bidding wars for shows which raised costs.

Other major Chinese video platforms with longer-form content include Tencent Video, Alibaba-owned Youku and Bilibili.

Qualcomm is already designing chips in India as it taps on the country’s pool of talented engineers, Qualcomm India’s president said in an exclusive interview.

“We already have chips that are actually designed completely end to end in India and we are shipping those globally,” Savi Soin, president of Qualcomm India, told CNBC.

The American chip giant designs semiconductors and wireless telecommunications products. Qualcomm is best known for its Snapdragon processors which power some of the top Android smartphones across the world.

Like any chip designer, Qualcomm doesn’t manufacture its own chips. Instead, it relies on chip manufacturers such as TSMC, Samsung Electronics and GlobalFoundries.

“We have more engineers in India now than we have anywhere else in the globe,” said Soin. “We have a lot of engineers here doing end-to-end chip design.”

The chip design process is “highly complex” as it requires “years of R&D, hundreds of millions of dollars of investment, and thousands of engineers,” said Semiconductor Industry Association in a report.

An integral part of the semiconductor manufacturing process, chip design defines the requirements for the chip’s architecture and system, as well as how individual circuits will be laid out on the chip.

Local media reported in January that Qualcomm is expanding its Chennai operations with a new design center focusing on wireless technology.

The 1.77 billion rupee ($21.3 million) investment will also support Qualcomm’s commitment to the Indian government’s vision of “Make in India” and “Design in India.”

“We saw India 20 years ago as a great R&D center of excellence and a great pool of talent. We’re seeing India as a great market, as [a] great opportunity,” Soin told CNBC’s Sri Jegarajah.

“We are now in discussion with a lot of semiconductor back-ends as well as manufacturing that India is trying to set up. Our CEO committed two years ago that if India sets up semiconductor manufacturing, we will actually help bring volume to that,” said Soin.

India’s semiconductor ambitions have made huge strides with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government approving three semiconductor plants in Gujarat and Assam with investments of more than $15 billion.

“India already has deep capabilities in chip design. With these units, our country will develop capabilities in chip fabrication. Advanced packaging technologies will be indigenously developed in India,” according to a government statement on Feb. 29.

India wants to become a major chip hub to compete against the U.S., Taiwan and South Korea, and has been wooing foreign chip makers to set up operations in the country. Countries such as India stands to benefit as global chipmakers look to diversify operations amid geopolitical uncertainty.

To boost domestic manufacturing capabilities and exports, India has announced billions of dollars worth of production-linked incentives to “attract investment” in key areas and cutting-edge technology as well as to make India “an integral part of the global value chain.”

India aims to be one of the top five semiconductor manufacturers globally in the next five years, Ashwini Vaishnaw, minister of electronics and information technology, railways and communications, told CNBC in March.

“What we have seen is – for example, the PLI benefits – it certainly has brought manufacturing of more and more smartphones into India,” said Soin.

“So we have seen good incentives on IT, telecom and telecom equipment that’s manufacturing here. We are seeing some discussions around the design elements. So we’re hoping that more and more things, some elements of our products that use our technology, get designed in India,” said Soin.

Apple is one of the companies that has diversified some of its manufacturing operations to India amid U.S.-China geopolitical tensions. Apple now assembles about 14% of its iPhones in India, which is twice the amount it produced there last year, according to a Bloomberg report.

Google plans to begin production of its Pixel smartphones in India by second quarter, Nikkei Asia reported February.