At the height of Japan’s fight against the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2021, a momentous ceremony was held in the port city of Kobe. Four men in dark suits lined up on a red carpet behind golden posts linked by ornate ribbons. With scissors in hand, they stood in front of rows of large cabinets, ready to unveil Japan’s new age in advanced computing.

Behind them was Fugaku, the world’s fastest supercomputer at the time, named after Japan’s highest peak, Mount Fuji, a symbol of prosperity. The ribbon-cutting and turning on of the $1bn machine was met with applause from the TV crews, politicians and luminaries in attendance.

“It was a big moment for everyone,” recalls Satoshi Matsuoka, one of the ribbon cutters and director of the Riken Centre for Computational Sciences. Fugaku, which took seven years to be jointly developed by Riken and tech conglomerate Fujitsu, is not just a symbol of national pride. It is viewed as key to ensuring Japan’s competitiveness and is used for critical national research projects, including those that helped contain the spread of Covid-19. 

Supercomputers — the fastest computers at any point in time — have become central to the competitiveness of companies and countries alike. They are the machines that enable the development of artificial intelligence (AI), including large language models such as ChatGPT. Supercomputers are used to conduct simulations that help with everything from weather forecasting to new drug discovery, special effects in movies and product development. 

“The utilisation of supercomputers, including Fugaku, is of utmost importance in enhancing international competitiveness,” says Yutaka Imamoto, the director of Foundation for Computational Science, an organisation established by the Kobe city and Hyogo Prefecture government to promote the use of supercomputers in Japan’s industrial sector. “The need for high-performance supercomputers to simulate challenging issues with greater accuracy is essential for meeting the demands of various companies.”

Disaster recovery

Fugaku’s positioning in Kobe is no coincidence. The city suffered a catastrophic earthquake in 1995 which killed more than 6000 people, devastated the local economy and diminished Kobe’s position as Japan’s main trading hub. Reconstruction of the port took just over two years, but it never returned to its former glory of being the country’s largest transhipment hub.

Then in 2007, Kobe was selected as the location to build Japan’s next-generation K supercomputer, the predecessor to Fugaku which was decommissioned in August 2019. While Kobe offered a location with cheap real estate and the right infrastructure, the placement of the computing infrastructure in the city was another way to fuel its post-disaster revival. 

“It was a symbol of the recovery,” says Mr Matsuoka. Fugaku, and the Riken computing centre it sits within, are located on a man-made island nicknamed ‘Portopia’. On the island sits an ecosystem of hospitals, universities and more than 350 companies, particularly in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries.

“For Kobe and Hyogo to have the medical and pharmaceutical institutions co-located with [Riken and Fugaku], it signifies the fact that the entire city and region is dedicated to providing advanced technologies in these areas,” says Mr Matsuoka.  

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Fugaku is not only a tool for post-disaster economic recovery in Kobe. It is used to conduct research and mitigate future disasters including tsunamis, earthquakes and public health emergencies. 

“Japan is frequently hit by natural disasters such as earthquakes and typhoons, so disaster preparedness is very important from both social and economic perspectives,” says Akira Saito, the general manager of industrial promotion at the Research Organisation for Information Science and Technology (RIST), which supports users of Fugaku and 13 other supercomputers at universities and research institutions across Japan.

“Large-scale disaster predictions are required both in academia and in business, and it is becoming increasingly important to simulate them in advance with Fugaku,” he adds.

This was proven true during the Covid-19 pandemic. Fugaku modelled whether it would be safe for fans to attend the Tokyo Olympics, demonstrating its value in reducing time to assess threats and come up with solutions. The political decision was made to not allow any crowds.

“Fugaku was so valuable in Japan’s fight against Covid that the funds kept pouring in; that allowed us to pay for the machine,” says Mr Matsuoka. Extensive simulations on Fugaku of how Covid-19 droplets and aerosols are transmitted showed that wearing masks and ventilation helped limit the virus’s spread.

Much of this research was then commercialised into anti-Covid protective gear, including Japanese clothing retailer Uniqlo’s masks. A joint research project between Riken and Fujitsu used Fugaku to develop digital twins of organs such as brains, hearts and respiratory systems, in a bid to aid drug discovery and development. A Fujitsu spokesperson says that Fugaku has been used for various technological advancement projects, including in quantum computing, material science, AI, manufacturing and space.

Innovation ecosystem

Fugaku has played a role in putting Kobe back on the map, among a number of major multinationals. In October 2023, Microsoft opened one of its six global AI co-innovation centres in the city. Located just over the bridge from the Port Island, the centre will be used to help companies incorporate AI into their manufacturing and other business processes.

“From now on, more and more products will connect to networks and digital technologies, greatly expanding their value and creating new value. This lab will be a magnet for businesses to meet and create new opportunities,” Yasuhiko Hashimoto, president and CEO of Kawasaki Heavy Industries, was quoted as saying in Microsoft’s investment announcement.

On the reclaimed island where Fugaku is located, German pharmaceuticals giant Bayer has established a new incubator, alongside another in Shanghai, China. US-based gene specialist VectorBuilder also set up a subsidiary in Kobe in July 2023 and opened a new facility in Kobe Medical Industry City. 

With a bullet-train station and airport close by, the local government is “trying to attract companies to develop a business ecosystem combining the advantages of the location with the computational science and the life sciences,” says Mr  Saito of RIST. The government has also begun a feasibility study to develop its successor. Building on its achievements to-date, Japan is working to ensure that Fugaku’s value to the country is continued well into the future.

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