Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia Corp., speaks to media members after the company’s “Japan AI Ecosystem” reception in Tokyo, Japan, Thursday, July 16, 2026.
Kiyoshi Ota | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Nvidia unveiled a new AI model for robots and vision AI agents on Wednesday, deepening its push into the physical AI market in Japan.
The company’s new model, Cosmos 3 Edge, is a so-called world model designed to help systems perceive and navigate physical environments in real time. Cosmos 3 Edge is a world model that can learn from a wider range of inputs compared to large language models (LLMs). The rollout follows the launch of Cosmos 3 in May.
Regional expansion is the focus of CEO Jensen Huang’s two-day visit to Japan, where the Silicon Valley chip giant is expanding its physical AI presence by forming a coalition that Nvidia says local industrial giants including Fujitsu, Hitachi and Kawasaki Heavy Industries want to join.
“The next frontier of AI is in the physical world, and this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Japan,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said in a statement Wednesday. “Japan invented modern manufacturing. Now it has the opportunity to reinvent it for the age of smart industries.”
The tech giant’s partnership with Japanese companies comes just a few months later MicrosoftThe company’s $10 billion investment in the country aims to expand AI infrastructure and improve cybersecurity. Japanese investment giant SoftBank has bet heavily on the AI boom. The company is looking to partner with Microsoft and Sakura Internet to develop AI in Japan.
According to the International Trade Administration, Japan’s AI market is expected to reach $27.9 billion by 2029, opening doors for investment by U.S. companies. This growth is fueled by Tokyo’s active efforts to promote AI adoption across industries, as well as local companies’ willingness to forge international partnerships.
Ajay Rajadhyaksha, global chairman of research at Barclays, told CNBC last month that the country has an advantage in Asia based on its diverse AI and clean structural growth stories.
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Nvidia’s partnership offensive
Nvidia is also aggressively expanding its AI presence into Japan’s healthcare and biotech sectors, expanding its reach into agent AI for advanced sciences through new drug discovery and medical robotics initiatives.
When it comes to agent AI, Nvidia highlighted the ongoing expansion of Tokyo-1, the AI drug discovery consortium run by Xeureka Mitsui Subsidiary. The platform, which has grown steadily since it was first announced in 2023, is based on the Nvidia BioNeMo Agent Toolkit, a platform to accelerate autonomous AI drug discovery.
Japan’s pharmaceutical heavyweights are already expanding their commitment. Major drug manufacturers, including Astellas Pharma Inc, Daiichi SankyoAnd Ono Pharmaceutical are using Nvidia’s special biology toolkit to optimize their workflows, the US company said in a blog post.
Beyond biotechnology, Nvidia also wants to expand into industrial automation through a partnership with Nvidia Kawasaki Heavy Industries.
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https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/16/nvidia-reveals-new-ai-model-and-expands-japans-physical-ai-ecosystem.html
