China covets Japan's IoT expertise -- missing piece in tech quest

Automation technologies seen as key to reducing dependence on US tech

20200323N China industrial robots

A factory makes industrial robots in the city of Haimen in China's Jiangsu Province. (FeatureChina via AP Images)

MOTOKAZU MATSUI, Nikkei staff writer

TOKYO -- As China strives to become a high-tech manufacturing powerhouse, it is aggressively courting Japanese companies to gain access to their "internet of things" know-how in manufacturing.

Beijing is trying to reduce the country's reliance on American companies for high-tech devices amid the trade war, and it sees Japanese technologies, particularly in automated manufacturing, as key to realizing domestic production of state-of-the-art technologies.

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