{"id":736161,"date":"2026-08-13T01:36:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T01:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/736161\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T01:36:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T01:36:08","slug":"why-japanese-firms-are-being-so-slow-to-use-ai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/736161\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Japanese firms are being so slow to use AI"},"content":{"rendered":"

However, critics argue that at each of these businesses only a tiny proportion of staff are actually using the AI, and that those who do so are only using it to a very limited extent.<\/p>\n

Prof Yasushi Ogasawara, an expert on Japan’s social system and technology at Meiji University, says there aren’t enough tech-savvy people in the workforce.<\/p>\n

“Although the Japanese like playing with gadgets such as smartphones, digital literacy is low here,” he says.<\/p>\n

This is highlighted by one report earlier this year which said Japan faced a shortfall , external<\/a>of almost 800,000 IT professionals by 2030.<\/p>\n

Many companies are also said to struggle with out-of-date computer systems, with around 60% more than 20-years-old.<\/p>\n

Moreover, Ogasawara adds that Japanese companies are under more pressure to avoid fuelling unemployment than they are to develop AI which could result in job losses.<\/p>\n

“The government is talking about AI, re-skilling, digital skills, but in reality, it is difficult to adapt human resources to digital skills because the top priority is to maintain full employment,” he says.<\/p>\n

But there is a shift in recruitment, with some companies now prioritising “AI literacy” in their new graduate hiring.<\/p>\n

In the private sector, larger firms such as Kanematsu, a major general trading company, are hiring savvy graduates such as Uta Yamaguchi who joined in April.<\/p>\n

“I use AI quite often at work,” she says. “Many of my colleagues use it a lot. For writing emails for my boss, summarising complicated documents, meeting recording and summarising.”<\/p>\n

But, by contrast with the US, she says AI systems that can autonomously handle multi-step work are still virtually unheard of in Japan.<\/p>\n

However, her employer, known for its forward thinking, now has them onboard.<\/p>\n

Ogasawara says that “change in Japan is limited”. He adds: “Japanese society expects painless reform, so I think it can be said that drastic reform is difficult, to say the least.”<\/p>\n

Disruption may be a dirty word in Japan, but without it the productivity gains the country needs could remain elusive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"However, critics argue that at each of these businesses only a tiny proportion of staff are actually using…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":736162,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-736161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/736161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=736161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/736161\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/736162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=736161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=736161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=736161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}