Hitachi, Ltd. announced it is collaborating with NVIDIA to accelerate social innovation and digital transformation by combining Hitachi's domain solutions in operational technology (OT) and leadership in key industries including energy, mobility, and connected systems with NVIDIA's expertise in generative AI. Generative AI has made a tremendous impact in the enterprise and consumer arena, bringing about a new wave of digital transformation, which promises to redefine product experiences and deliver a new level of efficiency to organizations. Through this collaboration, generative AI will now be extended into the industrial sphere by capturing vast amounts of data generated in the world of OT -- from various sensors, devices and industrial machines -- and applied to streamline performance, gain insights, and allow organizations to automate actions that have not previously been possible.

Generative AI has demonstrated tangible proof points in improving the performance of organizations in automating tasks, creating efficiencies, and enhancing products and services. Due to its remarkable impact, generative AI has widely been adopted in all industries -- becoming a critical technology for innovation and growth and an enabler for transformative solutions. The NVIDIA-accelerated computing platform supports large-scale language models and creative generation, and its advanced technological capabilities in AI software and simulation are contributing to innovation in all industries, from energy to drug discovery to manufacturing.

With approximately 320,000 employees across the globe, Hitachi is an established leader in Information Technology (IT), Operational Technology (OT) and Products for the physical world including advanced solutions for energy, mobility, and industrial sectors. In May 2023, Hitachi launched its advanced Generative AI Center to promote the safe and effective use of generative AI both inside and outside the company. Hitachi has successfully deployed generative AI in numerous use cases to boost innovation, improve efficiency and productivity for employees and clients.

As a result of these efforts, Hitachi has conducted more than 100 projects in Japan and across the globe enabling enhanced problem solving and innovation using generative AI. Furthermore, to accelerate AI transformation, Hitachi will create and host an environment running on NVIDIA-accelerated computing and develop a common platform for generative AI which incorporates Hitachi's domain knowledge and strengths in software development. 1. Next-generation industrial simulation and optimization Hitachi has crafted a bold vision for projects that will go beyond the conventional.

Specifically, by utilizing NVIDIA Omniverse, a platform for connecting and developing OpenUSD applications, and NVIDIA Modulus, a framework for building, training, and fine-tuning physics-machine learning models, Hitachi can develop simulate and optimize various assets and processes for mission-critical fields such as energy and transportation in a digital twin environment. The results can then be reflected in the real world, allowing for the collaborative development of large-scale solutions that can, for example, accelerate the transition to green energy, enable new innovations in healthcare, or enhance the safety of transportation systems, while validating and improving their effectiveness. 2. Hitachi industrial AI solutions on NVIDIA AI Enterprise Hitachi Lumada's AI solution library, for which Hitachi has built a track record of value creation in various industries, will also be integrated with the NVIDIA AI Enterprise and Modulus platforms. Leveraging Hitachi's design and digital engineering capabilities, these solutions will enable customers in various industries, including transportation, energy, industrial, and finance, to accelerate innovation, enhance their offerings, and create a new range of intelligent, AI-centric solutions.

3. Development of a new portfolio of AI solutions "Hitachi iQ" Enabled by the collaboration, Hitachi Vantara will launch the first offering under the Hitachi iQ portfolio. The new offering will undergo NVIDIA DGX BasePOD certification, providing customers with a fully certified, integrated solution, built on NVIDIA DGX infrastructure and highly reliable storage. Offered through multiple consumption models, Hitachi Vantara will provide customers with mechanisms to consume just what they need, all while providing improved on-premises performance and allowing for a better ROI from their AI-enabled storage and data infrastructure.

Hitachi iQ will also release a high-end NVIDIA HGX offering ? powered by NVIDIA H100 Tensor Core GPUs ? and a set of midrange PCIe based offerings, consisting of NVIDIA H100 Tensor Core and L40S GPUs 8. As a complement to these products, Hitachi Vantara will also offer NVIDIA AI Enterprise, a software platform comprising enterprise-grade AI tools and frameworks.

Lastly, Hitachi Vantara will offer a new Generation 5-based accelerated storage node utilizing the Hitachi Content Software for File storage technology, which will enable it to deliver extremely fast storage solutions for complex AI workloads. Hitachi Vantara's iQ portfolio is expected to be generally available in the first quarter of Hitachi's fiscal year 2024.