According to a June 2 report by Nikkei, the Japanese government has decided to participate in the U.S.-led national AI project “Genesis Mission,” becoming the first country in the world to join the program. The two governments plan to invest a total of $1 billion over the next five years — with Japan contributing approximately $500 million — for joint AI development and related technology fields. Officials from Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry will visit the U.S. in early June to formally announce the cooperation plan with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), which is leading the project. Areas of collaboration will cover quantum technology, nuclear fusion, and biotechnology. By joining, Japan will gain access to the vast scientific data, supercomputing resources, and AI research infrastructure accumulated by U.S. national laboratories.
The Genesis Mission was officially launched by Trump in November 2025 via executive order, with the DOE taking the lead. The goal is to harness AI to accelerate scientific research and technological innovation, aiming to double U.S. R&D efficiency within a decade. The U.S. government has positioned it as a national-level undertaking comparable to the Manhattan Project and the Apollo Program. So far, the DOE has signed memoranda of understanding with 24 partner institutions and has invested more than $320 million in advancing AI scientific infrastructure. It plans to launch the first major AI challenge pilot tackling a major scientific problem by September 2026. Analysts point out that Japan’s early participation is a significant signal of the U.S. accelerating the formation of a technology alliance amid the Sino-American competition for dominance in cutting-edge technologies such as AI, and it also creates demonstration pressure on other allies like South Korea.