Today's Letter IEDI summarizes recent industrial policy initiatives in Japan. Since 2015, the government has been adopting proactive measures aimed at accelerating the Fourth Industrial Revolution in the country, with a view to strengthening the competitiveness of its economy and creating new markets for the manufacturing industry and in areas such as medicine, agriculture, distribution, etc.

This study is part of the set of works that IEDI has been carrying out on Industry 4.0, which includes: Letters IEDI n. 797 "Industry 4.0: Challenges and Opportunities for Brazil" of July 21, 2017; n. 803 "Industry 4.0: The Future of Industry" of Sep 01, 17; n. 807 "Industrial policy for the future – Germany's INDUSTRIE 4.0 Initiative" of Sep 29, 17; n. 820 "Industry 4.0: The US Strategic Plan for Advanced Manufacturing" of Dec 11, 17; n. 823 "Industry 4.0: National policies and strategies under the new productive revolution" of Dec 29, 17; n. 827 "The 'Made in China 2025' initiative" of Jan 26, 2018 and n. 831 "Industry 4.0: South Korea and the Industry of the Future" of Feb 16, 18.

Japan —the world's most sophisticated industrial nation, with world-leading companies in a variety of sectors— is a case of success in using industrial policy for growth and socioeconomic development. One aspect of its industrial policy is the establishment of decision-making councils for the formulation of measures, which include government officials, industry representatives, academics and researchers. These boards make industrial policy more effective by improving the flow of information between the government and the private sector on the one hand, and among the companies themselves.

Started in the 1950s, this practice remains active in Japan today and plays a central role in the design and implementation of strategies for the development of innovations associated with the Fourth Industrial Revolution. In this context, as in other industrialized countries, Japanese industrial policy has increasingly focused on innovation, which is a source of high potential for economic growth and solutions to social challenges.

The Japanese government's agenda in response to the Fourth Industrial Revolution is a medium to long-term roadmap, firmly based on cooperation and partnership with the private sector. It combines strategies focused on the development of specific technological domains (robotics, information technology, artificial intelligence, among others) with strategies to disseminate their results in different economic and social activities.

In February 2015, for example, a new robot development strategy was adopted by the Japanese government to secure the country's position as a Superpower in Robotics, given the recent challenge posed by US initiatives. In particular, the United States and European countries are taking advantage of the ongoing technological changes to gain leadership in the development and use of new advanced robots.

The Japanese strategy is, thus, aimed not only at production but also at the dissemination of the systematic use of robots in the various sectors of the manufacturing industry (currently highly concentrated in the automotive and electronics sectors), services, infrastructure and agriculture, encompassing mainly small to medium-sized enterprises, which depend especially on the human labor force.

In this sense, the Robot Revolution Initiative was created, working closely not only with Japanese public-private organizations, such as the Industrial Competitiveness Council, the Science and Technological Innovation Council, the Council for Regulatory Reform and domestic industrial associations. Also involved are foreign organizations such as the Industrial Internet Initiative in the United States and Industry 4.0 in Germany.

Another important partnership between government, industry and academia has evolved, in 2015, into the formation of the New Industrial Structure Committee. Discussions in this Committee were consolidated in the report "Future Vision towards 2030s". This material is a response from the Japanese government to the Fourth Industrial Revolution, aiming to build a super-intelligent society ("Society 5.0"), which, through the full use of technological innovations, combines physical space (real world) and cyberspace (virtual world) in order to provide the goods and services needed to cope with a wide variety of social needs.

The document presents the policy guidelines and specific strategies to redesign the socioeconomic system by year 2030. It also indicates the direction for transformations in certain sectors, such as manufacturing, mobility and autonomous driving, health and medical care, agriculture, education and tourism, among others. 

In order to accelerate the development of artificial intelligence technology (AI), which is essential for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and to promote its fusion with related technologies, in April 2016 the Government of Japan created the Artificial Intelligence Technology Strategy Council, chaired by Prime Minister Shinzō Abe. In March 2017 this Council, which coordinates policies developed by different ministries, released Japan's strategy for AI technology. Based on the concept of AI as a service, a medium to long-term strategic roadmap for the development and industrialization of R&D results in AI was defined for three priority areas (productivity, health, medical care and well-being, and mobility) by 2030.

In March 2017, Prime Minister Shinzō Abe announced the concept of "Connected Industries". The policy was formulated by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, which has been holding several meetings with representatives of the industrial world and specialists. The Japanese government hopes that this concept will become a major competence of Japanese industries in the future, as was the case with the policies Made in Japan, Industrial Robots and Kaizen (continuous improvement).

The full text is available in Portuguese.