The basic research initiated at the time of ATR's founding, including machine translation, optical inter-satellite communications, and ATR-based high-realism communications, has met the needs of the COVID-19 period and has been commercialized after more than 30 years. Many of us have sheltered ourselves in a personal space due to the spread of the pandemic, but we now revel in the coming bright season, like wintering insects emerging from hibermation, with the Osaka/Kansai Expo approaching.

Japanese society, which has been optimized by legal compliance and the division of labor established in industrialized society, is now bereft of the human resources needed to invest in new projects, contributing to the stagnation of GDP.
Gene Sharpe's “From Dictatorship to Democracy,” newly considered in light of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, lists seven factors of submission to dictatorship: habit, indifference, fear, self-interest, cooperativeness, moral duty, and lack of self-confidence for disobedience. If we regard the last three points, respectively, as conjecture about the intentions of superiors, blind obedience to rules, ant the lack of confidence to start new business, they become our weakness, or our cage, the prevents new business.

It is only a matter of time before Al replaces the existing “jobs” in which we toil inside the cages we have created ourselves. We need to be courageous enough to reach out from inside the cage and join hands with like-minded people to launch new jobs and businesses. Since ATR focuses on the people who make up society and strives to empower people through ICT technology, we aim to promote research and development that contributes to this end.

I sincerely thank you fo your continued support.