Japanese Cyber Security Inward Mission 2024 highlights

The visit follows a successful Innovate UK Global Expert Mission (GEM) in early 2023, where a UK delegation travelled to Tokyo, Japan, to gain a deeper understanding of the country’s cyber security innovation landscape and to identify potential collaboration opportunities.

UK-Japan partnership

The UK and Japan are close security partners with shared values and willingness to work together on global security, cyber resilience and science, technology and innovation.

The two countries also have a close relationship through their respective innovation funding agencies, Innovate UK and the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO). In 2023 Innovate UK and NEDO signed a 5-year Memorandum of Understanding with the objective of further deepening its co-innovation relationship.

Inward Mission

The visiting Japanese delegation comprised of representatives from the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Japan Cybersecurity Innovation Committee, Institute of Information Security, ICT-ISAC, National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), Toshiba, NEC, NTT Security, and the universities of Tohoku, Yokohoma, and Osaka.

The delegation visited Cambridge, Birmingham and London to meet with experts from across the UK including the Innovate UK Catapult Network (Connected Places, Digital, High Value Manufacturing and Satellite Applications), National Physical Laboratory (NPL), BT Group, PETRAS National Centre of Excellence and the Manufacturing Technology Centre.

A key highlight from the visit was attending CYBERUK 2024, the UK government’s flagship cyber security event at the ICC Birmingham.

Forging future collaborations

Innovate UK are building on the UK’s reputation as a global innovation leader with a renowned research and knowledge base, outstanding facilities, and strong regulatory framework.

The inward mission marked a significant stride towards fostering innovation and investment by facilitating collaboration among industry, academia and government bodies in the UK and Japan, fostering exploration of new ideas and opportunities.

About Global Expert Missions

Global Expert Missions (GEMs) are funded by Innovate UK and designed to build international collaborations with governments, societies, enterprises, institutions, and people from every corner of the globe. With global challenges requiring international perspectives, the programme aims to support the UK government’s ambition to be the international partner of choice and a global hub for innovation by 2035.

Further information

At the start of 2024, Japan and the UK agreed to a Memorandum of Cooperation to strengthen collaborative public-private cyber partnerships between the two countries. Read the press release for more information.

Read the 2023 report from the Cybersecurity Japan GEM for an in-depth analysis of the tour featuring a market overview, the research and innovation landscape, a summary of stakeholder meetings, and opportunities for collaborations.