Sumitomo Rubber AI-tech centre to target autonomous, skills challenges

Kobe, Japan – Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI) has opened a new research base at Hokkaido University to develop technologies aimed at addressing workforce shortages and changes in the mobility sector.

Located within the university’s data-driven interdisciplinary research emergence centre (D-RED), the Sapporo unit will focus on AI and related technologies that “can make autonomous decisions and operate in the real world.”

According to the group, the centre will also promote and advance technological innovation that will “pave the way for the future of manufacturing” and create “new social value” for mobility.

SRI will bring expertise in rubber and high-performance materials to the partnership while Hokkaido University will contribute knowhow in image and video recognition and analysis.

The move, it said, responds to the “rapidly changing” manufacturing environment, marked by challenges such as a declining workforce, skills shortages and carbon neutrality demands.

In the automotive sector, SRI pointed to the shift to EVs, advances in autonomous driving, and redesigned regional transport.

Against this backdrop, SRI said the project will seek to advance and adopt 'physical AI' to combine “the strengths of both people and AI” in manufacturing.

Work will focus on applying AI to new research themes from production sites, with students contributing original ideas for potential social implementation.

The Sapporo facility is SRI’s second innovation base dedicated to integrating different research fields: following the opening of a similar centre in Sendai in 2023.

The initiative supports SRI’s long-term RISE2035 strategy which aims to create “new 'experiential' value from rubber.”