Press Release

April 10, 2024

University of Tsukuba and University of Washington Forge AI Partnershipwith NVIDIA and Amazon

From left to right, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina RAIMONDO, Amazon Senior Vice President DavidZAPOLSKY, UW Provost Tricia SERIO, University of Tsukuba President NAGATA Kyosuke, NVIDIA Vice President
Ned FINKLE, and Japanese Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology MORIYAMA
Masahito.

On the occasion of the Japan-US Summit, University of Tsukuba and University ofWashington have entered into a landmark partnership in collaboration with andfunded by NVIDIA and Amazon. This Japan-US partnership is aimed at fosteringresearch, human resource development, entrepreneurship, and social
implementation in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). The agreement wasannounced on April 9th in Washington D.C., where representatives from both
universities and collaborating U.S. corporations participated in a signing ceremony.
The signing ceremony for this partnership took place at the U.S. Department of Commerce,coinciding with Prime Minister KISHIDA Fumio's visit to the United States. High-ranking officials
from both countries were present, including Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Scienceand Technology, MORIYAMA Masahito from Japan, Ambassador of Japan to the U.S., YAMADA
Shigeo, and U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina RAIMONDO. The ceremony was held on April
9th at 3 PM local time (April 10th, 4 AM Japan time).

Press Release

University of Tsukuba President NAGATA Kyosuke, University of Washington Provost Tricia
SERIO, NVIDIA Vice President Ned FINKLE, and Amazon Senior Vice President David ZAPOLSKY
joined the signing.
President NAGATA issued a statement: "AI technology is a crucial pillar supporting our futuresociety, and advancing its research and human resource development in this area is asignificant challenge. While Japan and the U.S. have been collaborating on research in thefield of semiconductors, research utilizing semiconductor-based resources is becoming
increasingly important. From this perspective, we believe this AI partnership will also play a
crucial role in leading Japan-U.S. cooperation. Under the slogan 'Beyond the Borders,'
University of Tsukuba has been promoting fundamental and applied research on AI
through an interdisciplinary research network. We are deeply honored to sign this Letter ofIntent (LOI) to strengthen our global partnership in this field. We hope that our collaborative
efforts within this partnership will contribute significantly to solving the many global
challenges facing the world today."Professor SAKURAI Tetsuya, Director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence Research (C-AIR)and a member of the Institute of Systems and Information Engineering of University ofTsukuba, also commented: "C-AIR has been promoting fundamental research as a hub foradvanced AI research, while also pursuing applied research in various fields such as medicine,healthcare, sports, manufacturing, and smart cities. AI will be crucial in supporting all sectorsof society, including daily life and industry. We expect that collaboration between Universityof Tsukuba, located in Tsukuba Science City with its numerous national research
institutions, and the University of Washington, located in Seattle with its concentration ofhigh-tech companies, and the participating companies will further promote international AI
research between Japan and the U.S. and lead to the creation of societal values. Throughthis partnership, we will promote advanced AI research leading to social implementationand the development of world-leading global AI talent."
This partnership is expected to be included in the joint statement to be announced at theJapan-U.S. summit on April 10th. It is part of a new framework for collaboration between
universities and companies with a total private sector investment of US$ 110 million. Notably,
Amazon and NVIDIA are expected to contribute US$ 25 million each to this initiative. The
partnership is a result of the strong cooperative relationship that University of Tsukuba andUniversity of Washington have built over several years.
We express our sincere gratitude to Amazon and NVIDIA, who have pledged their support forthis agreement, as well as to Ambassador Emanuel for his dedicated efforts.

Press Release(Articles issued by the institutions involved)
UW
https://www.washington.edu/news/2024/04/09/uw-joins-110-million-cross-pacific-effort-toadvance-artificial-intelligence/
NVIDIA
https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/partnership-universities-teach-ai-skills
Amazonhttps://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/amazon-invests-25-million-ina-10-year-research-collaboration-to-advance-ai

Contact:
Bureau of Public Relations of University of Tsukuba+81-29-853-2040
kohositu@un.tsukuba.ac.jp

Reference MaterialsSAKURAI Tetsuya
Director of Center for Artificial Intelligence, Professor at Institute ofSystems and Information Engineering, University of Tsukuba
Visiting Professor at The Open University of Japan
Visiting Senior Scientist at Riken Center for Computational Science
CEO at MathDesign, Co. Ltd.

Pioneering researcher in mathematical methods for AI
algorithms and computer simulation algorithms.
Recently working on developing AI technologies forprivacy enhancement through collaboration between
universities in Japan and the US.
Expertise
Mathematical algorithms, particularly in knowledge discovery and data analysis/image analysis
using latent spaces, AI algorithms such as neural network computations, algorithms forsupercomputers designed for large-scale simulations, and research in quantum computing
algorithms
Notes
Member of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) in the United States, theJapan Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, the Mathematical Society of Japan, andthe Information Processing Society.
Recipient of the Commendation for Science and Technology by the Minister of Education,
Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in 2018 for his achievements in high-performance
eigenvalue analysis algorithms.