Nvidia has recruited most of Japan’s industrial robotics establishment into the Cosmos Coalition, the open world-model programme it uses to seed its physical AI stack, in announcements timed to Jensen Huang’s week in Tokyo.
Twenty-two companies are named: AIRoA, classmethod, Enactic, FANUC, Fujitsu, GROOVE X, Hitachi, Honda R&D, Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Kubota, Mitsui & Co., Mitsubishi Corp., Mujin, NEC, Preferred Networks, SoftBank Corp., Sony Group, Telexistence, TIER IV, TRON K.K., Turing, and Yaskawa Electric.
All of them, in Nvidia’s wording, “intend to join”. No binding commitment has been disclosed, and no money has been mentioned in either direction.
That roll call is the news. FANUC and Yaskawa are the two largest industrial robot makers on earth by installed base, and they have spent decades running proprietary control stacks. Signing them up to a coalition organised around someone else’s open models is not a small thing, even at the level of intent.
It is also the same play Nvidia ran with Hyundai around the Atlas humanoid, and is running against Tesla’s vertically integrated Optimus programme: supply the stack, let the industrial partner own the deployment.The 💜 of EU techThe latest rumblings from the EU tech scene, a story from our wise ol' founder Boris, and some questionable AI art. It's free, every week, in your inbox. Sign up now!
