Nippon Steel set to complete $14bn acquisition of U.S. Steel next week
SHOTARO TANI and NAOKI MATSUDA
TOKYO -- U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday cancelled the decision by former President Joe Biden to block Nippon Steel's acquisition of U.S. Steel, paving the way for the Japanese company to finalize its takeover of its American counterpart.
Nippon Steel is expected to complete the acquisition on Wednesday U.S. time, buying all U.S. Steel shares for $14.1 billion.
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Asahi Shimbun
2 hours ago
- Asahi Shimbun
Hopes and fears build as Junglia Okinawa's opening nears
Construction on Junglia Okinawa as seen from The Asahi Shimbun's corporate plane ahead of its July opening on May 3 in Nakijin, Okinawa Prefecture (Tatsuya Shimada) NAHA—With a hefty price tag totaling 70 billion yen ($483 million), Junglia Okinawa's roller coaster-esque journey is barreling toward another summit as the theme park's much-anticipated July 25 opening nears. The construction of a theme park in the northern part of the prefecture is a clear departure from Okinawa's state-led economic promotion measures after the prefecture reverted from U.S. to Japanese rule in 1972. Junglia is one of the southernmost prefecture's largest private-sector projects ever, but it is not the first. Sour memories are resurfacing in some residents who remember another tourism endeavor that backfired even as expectations rise for the new park. When finished, Junglia will operate in Yanbaru, the name for the main island's northern half in the region's dialect. The mountainous area is about 90 minutes from the prefectural capital by car. The park, which will reportedly offer more than 20 attractions, is replacing what was a roughly 60-hectare golf course stretching across Nago and Nakijin. A dinosaur-themed ride and hot air balloon experience are among the attractions with an onsite spa as well. FAILED UNIVERSAL STUDIOS PROJECT No major undertaking is ever free from complications. Before Junglia, the operator of Universal Studios Japan in Osaka announced it was opening a park in the northern part of Okinawa's main island 10 years ago. The central government strongly backed USJ LLC's project, with then-Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga saying a new theme park was the key component of the government's economic promotion measures for the prefecture. However, the project plans were withdrawn about a year later after USJ's management was reshuffled. Dreams of building a theme park in the area would lie dormant until 2018 when marketing firm Katana Inc. and other companies announced a new plan and set it in motion. The only remaining tie to USJ was Tsuyoshi Morioka, who played a key role in reviving Universal Studios Japan and went on to found Katana after going independent. PURPOSEFULLY LOCAL The local business community has high hopes for Junglia. Unlike other extensive projects, the park's operator Japan Entertainment Inc. is based in the prefecture and was specifically founded in June 2018 as part of Katana's efforts for the theme park and larger goal of revitalizing Okinawa. Local ownership may provide Okinawa with a better chance to rebound from the unintended 'zaru keizai' (sieve economy) conundrum. The situation is the unfortunate outcome of the government introducing subsidies in an effort to eliminate the financial disparity between the island prefecture and the mainland; Okinawa was ruled by the U.S. military for 27 years following the end of World War II while Honshu experienced rapid economic growth during the same period. Mainland companies winning contracts for the high-percentage subsidies ultimately made it difficult for locals to benefit from the projects tied to them, something Junglia seeks to avoid. "It is also a project intended to boost the economy in Okinawa and its northern area," Morioka said during a news conference held in January. Japan Entertainment has emphasized the importance of hiring locals, saying it will employ a total of about 1,300 full- and part-time workers by the time the park opens. Junglia's shareholders also include leading Okinawan corporations such as Orion Breweries Ltd., headquartered in Tomigusuku, and Naha-based department store operator Ryubo Holdings Co. "It is a private sector-led project of an unprecedented scale,' said Denichiro Ishimine, Okinawa Electric Power Co. adviser and former head of a council for Okinawa-based economic associations. 'Located at the gateway to Asia, Okinawa has high international competitiveness for its nature and traditional culture originating from the Ryukyu Kingdom era, and the project can help improve the quality of tourism in Okinawa." Counterbalancing this sentiment are voices of concern over tourist congestion. Because Junglia is being built between the prefecture's expressway and the Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium in Motobu, which is already popular with tourists, it is feared that chronic traffic snarls, noise and other negative impacts could worsen the living environment. While Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki said during a prefectural assembly session that the prefectural government intends to make maximum use of Junglia's opening to create jobs and develop infrastructure around the site, he added, "We hope that the park operator will continue providing information to local residents and having conversations with them." POST-EXPO FALLOUT Some area residents still hold bitter memories of what came after the economic boom driven by the 1975 Okinawa Ocean Expo. The expo was held three years after Okinawa's return to Japan as part of the central government's First Okinawa Promotion and Development Plan. Today, the aquarium stands on the expo's former grounds. Yasukichi Miyagi, 81, a mango farmer in Nakijin near Junglia, owned a construction business at the time. He worked as a subcontractor for a company outside the prefecture while the expo venue, roads and other facilities were being built. This work required he purchase a small fleet of heavy machinery and hire enough people to fill orders. But the number of expo visitors fell short of the expected 4.5 million during its half-year run, and many companies that made major investments went bankrupt. Miyagi's firm escaped bankruptcy but he had to cut staff and equipment to barely break even. Since then, the village's population has decreased by about 40 percent from approximately 15,000 in 1950. Although Miyagi has a sense of crisis that the village could eventually disappear, Junglia is something positive to talk about. That said, it remains uncertain how the large-scale tourism project will affect the community and if those in charge can prevent history from repeating itself. "I wonder if it will really work," he mumbled. 'INEVITABLE CHALLENGE' REMAINS According to Moritake Tomikawa, a former vice governor of Okinawa Prefecture who is now a professor emeritus of economics at Okinawa International University, the addition of Junglia could be a way to solve problems such as depopulation and low-income levels. This applies not just in comparing the prefecture to the mainland, but the island's regions where the north lags economically behind the south. Despite the potential windfall, making the prefecture's economy solely dependent on tourism is still an unstable venture because it is easily influenced by external factors—the COVID-19 pandemic being the most devastating example. The prefectural government previously promoted manufacturing without much success and Okinawa's industrial structure remains weak. "As we move forward to achieving Okinawa's economic independence, it is an inevitable challenge to develop another industry on par with tourism," Tomikawa said.
Japan Today
3 hours ago
- Japan Today
Anthropic looking to power European tech with hiring push
As the AI race heats up, so does the race to find talent in the sector, which is currently dominated by US and Chinese companies By Tom BARFIELD American AI giant Anthropic aims to boost the European tech ecosystem as it expands on the continent, product chief Mike Krieger told AFP at the Vivatech trade fair in Paris. The OpenAI competitor wants to be "the engine behind some of the largest startups of tomorrow... (and) many of them can and should come from Europe", Krieger said. Tech industry and political leaders have often lamented Europe's failure to capitalise on its research and education strength to build heavyweight local companies -- with many young founders instead leaving to set up shop across the Atlantic. Krieger's praise for the region's "really strong talent pipeline" chimed with an air of continental tech optimism at Vivatech. French AI startup Mistral on Wednesday announced a multibillion-dollar tie-up to bring high-powered computing resources from chip behemoth Nvidia to the region. The semiconductor firm will "increase the amount of AI computing capacity in Europe by a factor of 10" within two years, Nvidia boss Jensen Huang told an audience at the southern Paris convention centre. Among 100 planned continental hires, Anthropic is building up its technical and research strength in Europe, where it has offices in Dublin and non-EU capital London, Krieger said. Beyond the startups he hopes to boost, many long-standing European companies "have a really strong appetite for transforming themselves with AI", he added, citing luxury giant LVMH, which had a large footprint at Vivatech. Mistral -- founded only in 2023 and far smaller than American industry leaders like OpenAI and Anthropic -- is nevertheless "definitely in the conversation" in the industry, Krieger said. The French firm recently followed in the footsteps of the U.S. companies by releasing a so-called "reasoning" model able to take on more complex tasks. "I talk to customers all the time that are maybe using (Anthropic's AI) Claude for some of the long-horizon agentic tasks, but then they've also fine-tuned Mistral for one of their data processing tasks, and I think they can co-exist in that way," Krieger said. So-called "agentic" AI models -- including the most recent versions of Claude -- work as autonomous or semi-autonomous agents that are able to do work over longer horizons with less human supervision, including by interacting with tools like web browsers and email. Capabilities displayed by the latest releases have raised fears among some researchers, such as University of Montreal professor and "AI godfather" Yoshua Bengio, that independently acting AI could soon pose a risk to humanity. Bengio last week launched a non-profit, LawZero, to develop "safe-by-design" AI -- originally a key founding promise of OpenAI and Anthropic. "A huge part of why I joined Anthropic was because of how seriously they were taking that question" of AI safety, said Krieger, a Brazilian software engineer who co-founded Instagram, which he left in 2018. Anthropic is still working on measures designed to restrict their AI models' potential to do harm, he added. But it has yet to release details of its "level 4" AI safety protections foreseen for still more powerful models, after activating ASL (AI Safety Level) 3 to corral the capabilities of May's Claude Opus 4 release. Developing ASL 4 is "an active part of the work of the company", Krieger said, without giving a potential release date. With Claude 4 Opus, "we've deployed the mitigations kind of proactively... safe doesn't have to mean slow, but it does mean having to be thoughtful and proactive ahead of time" to make sure safety protections don't impair performance, he added. Looking to upcoming releases from Anthropic, Krieger said the company's models were on track to match chief executive Dario Amodei's prediction that Anthropic would offer customers access to a "country of geniuses in a data centre" by 2026 or 2027 -- within limits. Anthropic's latest AI models are "genius-level at some very specific things", he said. "In the coming year... it will continue to spike in particular aspects of things, and still need a lot of human-in-the-loop coordination," he forecast. © 2025 AFP
Japan Today
3 hours ago
- Japan Today
Protesters crowd into streets, parks and plazas at anti-Trump 'No Kings' demonstrations across U.S.
Demonstrators march down Benjamin Franklin Parkway during the "No Kings" protest, Saturday, June 14, 2025, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura) By MARC LEVY and CLAUDIA LAUER Demonstrators crowded into streets, parks and plazas across the U.S. on Saturday to protest President Donald Trump, mixing anti-authoritarian messages with support for immigrants and calls to protect democracy. Governors across the U.S. urged calm and vowed no tolerance for violence, while some mobilized the National Guard ahead of marchers gathering in major downtowns and small towns. Through midday, confrontations were isolated. Atlanta's 5,000-capacity 'No Kings' rally quickly reached its limit, with thousands more demonstrators gathered outside barriers to hear speakers in front of the state Capitol. Huge crowds marched in New York, Denver, Chicago, Houston and Los Angeles, some behind 'no kings' banners. In Minnesota, organizers canceled demonstrations as police worked to track down a suspect in the shootings of two Democratic legislators and their spouses. Intermittent light rain fell as marchers gathered for the flagship rally in Philadelphia's Love Park. They shouted 'Whose streets? Our streets!' as they marched to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where they listened to speakers on the steps made famous in the movie 'Rocky.' 'So what do you say, Philly?' Democratic U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland shouted to the crowd. 'Are you ready to fight back? Do you want a gangster state or do you want free speech in America?' Trump was in Washington for a military parade marking the Army's 250th anniversary that coincides with the president's birthday. There, a massive demonstration toured the city's streets, led by a banner reading, 'Trump must go now.' In Charlotte, demonstrators trying to march through downtown briefly faced off with police forming a barricade with their bicycles, chanting 'let us walk," while law enforcement in northern Atlanta deployed tear gas to divert several hundred protesters heading toward Interstate 285. A journalist was seen being detained by officers and police helicopters flew above the crowd. In some places, organizers handed out little American flags while others flew their flags upside down, a sign of distress. Mexican flags, which have become a fixture of the Los Angeles protests against immigration raids, made an appearance at some demonstrations Saturday. Protests were planned in nearly 2,000 locations across the country, from city blocks and small towns to courthouse steps and community parks, organizers said. The 50501 Movement orchestrating the protests says it picked the 'No Kings' name to support democracy and speak out against what they call the authoritarian actions of the Trump administration. The name 50501 stands for 50 states, 50 protests, one movement. The demonstrations come on the heels of protests that flared up across the country over federal immigration enforcement raids that began last week and Trump ordering the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles, where protesters blocked a freeway and set cars on fire. Thousands gathered in downtown Love Park, with organizers handing out small American flags and people carried protest signs saying things like 'fight oligarchy' and 'deport the mini-Mussolinis." Karen Van Trieste, a 61-year-old nurse who drove up from Maryland, said she grew up in Philadelphia and wanted to be with a large group of people showing her support. 'I just feel like we need to defend our democracy,' she said. She is concerned about the Trump administration's layoffs of staff at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the fate of immigrant communities and the Trump administration trying to rule by executive order, she said. A woman wearing a foam Statue of Liberty crown brought a speaker system and led an anti-Trump sing-along, changing the words 'young man' in the song 'Y.M.C.A.' to 'con man.' One man in Revolutionary War era garb and a tricorn hat held a sign with a quote often attributed to Thomas Jefferson: 'All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.' Thousands gathered in front of City Hall in a boisterous crowd, waving signs and listening to a Native American drum circle and dance performances, before marching through the streets. Signs included 'They fear us, don't back down California,' 'Protesting is not a crime,' "We carry dreams not danger" and 'ICE out of LA.' One demonstrator carried a 2-foot-tall (60-centimeter) Trump pinata on a stick, with a crown on his head and sombrero hanging off his back while another hoisted a huge helium-filled orange baby balloon with blond hair styled like Trump's. Crowds cheered anti-Trump speakers in Charlotte's First Ward Park and chanted 'we have no kings' before marching behind a 'No Kings' banner through the city, chanting 'No kings, no crowns, we will not bow down" and 'Hey, hey, ho, ho, Donald Trump has got to go." Marchers stretched for blocks, led by a group of people holding a giant Mexican flag and bystanders cheering and clapping for protesters along the way. Jocelyn Abarca, a 21-year-old college student, said the protest was a chance to 'speak for what's right' after mass deportations and the deployment of the National Guard to deal with protesters in Los Angeles last week. 'If we don't stop it now, it's just going to keep getting worse,' she said of the Trump administration's actions. Before organizers canceled demonstrations in the state, Gov. Tim Walz took to social media to issue a warning after the shootings. "Out of an abundance of caution my Department of Public Safety is recommending that people do not attend any political rallies today in Minnesota until the suspect is apprehended," he wrote. About a thousand people gathered on the grounds of Florida's old Capitol in Tallahassee, where protesters chanted, 'This is what community looks like,' and carried signs with messages like 'one nation under distress' and 'dissent is patriotic.' Organizers of the rally explicitly told the crowd to avoid any conflicts with counterprotesters and to take care not to jaywalk or disrupt traffic. One march approached the gates of Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, where sheriff's deputies turned them back. Governors and city officials vowed to protect the right to protest and to show no tolerance for violence. Some urged calm, while Republican governors in Virginia, Texas, Nebraska and Missouri were mobilizing National Guard troops to help law enforcement manage demonstrations. Some governors urged calm and put state police on standby for the weekend. © Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
