President Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida avoided directly saying whether they discussed Nippon Steel’s proposed $14 billion purchase of the US Steel Corporation during a joint press conference yesterday.
The proposed sale is currently under review by the inter-agency Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States and anti-trust regulators.
President Biden raised eyebrows late last month when he came out in opposition to the sale before CFIUS has issued a verdict on whether there are national security concerns about the sale.
Prime Minister Kishida avoided answering whether he had brought up the issue during his meetings with the President, saying that he hopes the deal “will unfold in directions that would be positive for both sides.” He also noted that Japanese companies employ some one million workers in the United States.
The proposed acquisition is opposed by a number of Congressional lawmakers and organized labor. President Biden said that he stands by his commitment to US workers, and also his commitment to US allies.
Separately, Coommerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Saito Ken held the third Japan-US Commercial and Industrial Partnership ministerial meeting yesterday.
The two officials reviewed progress made to date in deepening bilateral economic and commercial cooperation, and discussed how they will contribute to the implementation of outcomes from the summit meeting held between the two leaders.
The two officials committed their ministries to accelerating Commerce-METI cooperation to achieve more transparent, robust and sustainable supply chains, including addressing non-market policies and practices and cooperating on current-generation and mature-node (“legacy”) semiconductors.
They also acknowledged the progress made through Commerce-METI cooperation in critical and emerging technologies, including semiconductors, AI, quantum and biotechnology, and committed to further collaboration between the ministries. They agreed to continue existing, robust export control cooperation to address national security threats and protect critical and emerging technologies from abuse by malign actors who seek to use them in contravention to regional and national security interests.
Following is the text of the economic section of the leaders’ joint statement:
Leading on Innovation, Economic Security, and Climate Action
The United States and Japan aim to maximally align our economic, technology, and related strategies to advance innovation, strengthen our industrial bases, promote resilient and reliable supply chains, and build the strategic emerging industries of the future while pursuing deep emissions reductions this decade.
Building on our efforts in the U.S.-Japan Competitiveness and Resilience (CoRe) Partnership, including through the U.S.-Japan Economic Policy Consultative Committee (our economic “2+2”), we intend to sharpen our innovative edge and strengthen our economic security, including by promoting and protecting critical and emerging technologies.
The United States and Japan welcome our robust economic and commercial ties through mutual investment, including Microsoft’s $2.9 billion investment in Japan on AI and cloud infrastructure, workforce training, and a research lab; and Toyota’s recent additional $8 billion battery production investment for a cumulative $13.9 billion investment in North Carolina.
Japan is the top foreign investor in the United States with nearly $800 billion in foreign direct investment, and Japanese companies employ nearly 1 million Americans across all 50 states.
Similarly, as a top foreign investor in Japan for many years, the United States is supporting Japan’s economic growth, and as two of the world’s largest financial sectors, we commit to strengthening our partnership to bolster cross-border investment and support financial stability.
As robust and creative economies, we also plan to accelerate investment in our respective start-up environments to foster innovation through the “Japan Innovation Campus” in Silicon Valley and the “Global Startup Campus” to be established in Tokyo, and in companies that take actions toward sustainable value creation (SX). We welcome our new Japan-U.S. personnel exchange programs on startups and venture capital firms under the Global Innovation through Science and Technology (GIST) initiative.
We are committed to strengthening our shared role as global leaders in the development and protection of next-generation critical and emerging technologies such as AI, quantum technology, semiconductors, and biotechnology through research exchange and private investment and capital finance, including with other like-minded partners. We welcome our collaboration on AI for Science between Riken and Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) founded on the revised project arrangement.
We applaud the establishment of $110 million in new AI research partnerships – between the University of Washington and University of Tsukuba and between Carnegie Mellon University and Keio University – through funding from NVIDIA, Arm, Amazon, Microsoft, and a consortium of Japanese companies. We are committed to further advancing the Hiroshima AI Process and strengthening collaboration between the national AI Safety Institutes.
Building on our long history of semiconductor cooperation, we intend to establish a joint technology agenda for cooperation on issues such as research and development, design, and workforce development. We also welcome the robust cooperation between and with our private sectors, especially in next-generation semiconductors and advanced packaging. We also plan to work together along with like-minded countries to strengthen global semiconductor supply chains, particularly for mature node (“legacy”) semiconductors through information-sharing, coordination of policies, and addressing vulnerabilities stemming from non-market policies and practices.
We also celebrate the signing of a Memorandum of Cooperation between Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) and the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) as a first step in bilateral cooperation on quantum computing.
Building on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) and our respective leadership of the G7 and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) last year, we continue to advance resilience, sustainability, inclusiveness, economic growth, fairness, and competitiveness for our economies.
We applaud the recent entry into force of the IPEF Supply Chain Agreement. We will continue to seek cooperation on critical minerals projects, including those along the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment Lobito Corridor, and through the Minerals Security Partnership (MSP) as well as the Partnership for Resilient and Inclusive Supply-chain Enhancement (RISE).
We are cooperating to deter and address economic coercion, through our bilateral cooperation as well as through our work with like-minded partners including the G7 Coordination Platform on Economic Coercion. We are working to uphold a free, fair and rules-based economic order; address non-market policies and practices; build trusted, resilient, and sustainable supply chains; and promote open markets and fair competition under the U.S.-Japan economic “2+2” and the U.S.-Japan Commercial and Industrial Partnership.
We will advance our commitment to operationalize data free flow with trust, including with respect to data security. We will also discuss the promotion of resilient and responsible seafood supply chains.
The United States and Japan recognize that the climate crisis is the existential challenge of our time and intend to be leaders in the global response. Towards our shared goal of accelerating the clean energy transition, we are launching a new high-level dialogue on how we implement our respective domestic measures and maximize their synergies and impacts, including the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act and Japan’s Green Transformation (GX) Promotion Strategy aimed at accelerating energy transition progress this decade, promoting complementary and innovative clean energy supply chains and improving industrial competitiveness.
Today we announce Japan joins as the first international collaborator of the U.S. Floating Offshore Wind Shot. We intend to work together towards global ambition in line with the Wind Shot, taking into consideration national circumstances, through the Clean Energy and Energy Security Initiative (CEESI) to pursue innovative breakthroughs that drive down technology costs, accelerate decarbonization, and deliver benefits for coastal communities.
The United States welcomes Japan’s newly-launched industry platform, the Floating Offshore Wind Technology Research Association (FLOWRA), aiming to reduce costs and achieve mass production of floating offshore wind through collaboration with academia.
We are further leading the way in developing and deploying next generation clean energy technology, including fusion energy development through the announcement of a U.S.-Japan Strategic Partnership to Accelerate Fusion Energy Demonstration and Commercialization.
The United States remains unwavering in its commitment to support the energy security of Japan and other allies, including its ability to predictably supply LNG while accelerating the global transition to zero-emissions energy and working with other fossil energy importers and producers to minimize methane emissions across the fossil energy value chain to the fullest extent practicable.
We intend to advance widespread adoption of innovative new clean energy technologies, and seek to increase the globally available supply of sustainable aviation fuel or feedstock, including those that are ethanol-based, that show promise in reducing emissions.
We are also working to align global health security and innovation, including in such areas as pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response and promoting more resilient, equitable, and sustainable health systems.
Today, we announce that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Japan’s Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency (PMDA) intend to collaborate and exchange information on oncology drug products to help cancer patients receive earlier access to medications and to discuss future drug development and ways to prevent drug shortages. We welcome PMDA’s future representative office in Washington, D.C., to facilitate this cooperation.
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