Japan growth strategy sets sights on shift to IT: draft

[TOKYO] Japan aims to encourage its companies to focus more on cutting-edge information technology such as big data and artificial intelligence, the latest draft of the government's growth strategy showed on Thursday.

The government wants to promote start-ups and more investment in fields such as the "Internet of Things," which allows everyday appliances to communicate with each other via the Internet, a copy of the draft obtained by Reuters showed.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government also wants to continue promoting the use of industrial robots, according to the draft, which lacked details on the exact steps the government will take.

The government will likely add more details to the plan before crafting a final version of the growth strategy due at the end of this month.

REUTERS