Jensen Huang Dismisses AI Slowdown Fears As Nvidia Launches Japan AI Factory

Nvidia is building Japan’s first national AI factory for physical AI with 13,750 Vera CPUs and 27,500 Rubin GPUs, while CEO Jensen Huang dismissed fears that the AI boom is slowing and said instead that it is “just beginning.”National AI factoryThe initiative, announced Thursday, will underpin Japan’s FRONTia Project, a government-backed effort to develop multimodal AI foundation models for robotics and industrial applications spanning manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, and telecommunications.The AI factory will be developed with Noetra Corp., a consortium backed by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), using Nvidia's latest Vera Rubin architecture.The facility will feature 13,750 Nvidia Vera CPUs, 27,500 Rubin GPUs, and 140 megawatts of data center capacity, providing computing power for open multimodal foundation models capable of supporting AI agents, digital twins, robotics, and other physical AI applications.According to Nvidia, pretrained models developed through the project will be made available to domestic developers and enterprises to accelerate Japan’s AI ecosystem.Japan's METI said the initiative forms the technological backbone of its FRONTia Project, designed to combine the country's manufacturing expertise with advanced AI infrastructure to strengthen industrial competitiveness.Speaking in Tokyo, Huang dismissed concerns that the AI investment cycle is nearing its peak, AFP reported. He added that most technology cycles last anywhere from 10 to 15 years before it plateaus.“We are at the beginning of this one,” Huang told reporters. The billionaire compared AI’s long-term adoption to electricity becoming embedded across society.Expanding robotics partnershipsAlongside the national AI infrastructure, Nvidia announced several partnerships with Japanese industrial companies.Kawasaki Heavy Industries will work with Nvidia to develop AI-powered robots for shipbuilding, targeting welding, painting, inspection, and material handling through digital twin and physical AI technologies.Kawasaki said Japan’s shipbuilding sector faces growing labor shortages due to an aging population, while demand for low- and zero-carbon vessels continues to rise, making automation increasingly critical.Nvidia also announced robotics collaborations with Fujitsu and other Japanese manufacturers as part of a broader push into physical AI.Earlier this week, the company said major Japanese industrial groups—including FANUC, Hitachi, SoftBank, Sony, NEC, Yaskawa Electric, and Kawasaki Heavy Industries—intend to join the Nvidia Cosmos Coalition to develop open physical AI models for manufacturing, mobility, and infrastructure.Forbes valuationHuang has a real-time net worth of $178.9 billion as of July 16, 2026, according to Forbes estimates.