With an endowment that includes a top-notch educational system, leadership in industries like industrial and automotive manufacturing, first-rate infrastructure, and a professional culture infused with a strong work ethic and repeatable processes to produce high-quality goods and services, Japan's economy was ranked as the third largest in the world in 2020. Yet, Japan’s productivity has gone from stagnant to declining, a course that needs imminent reversal to remain globally competitive. On the rise are competing nations making significant productivity gains through the development of technical talent and the application of proven digital technologies that include cloud-based infrastructure and software, mobile devices and apps, machine learning and deep learning, and many others. Digital talent: A bold plan to more than triple the bench of digital talent, focusing disproportionately on software developers, data engineers, data scientists, machine learning engineers, product