{"id":5479,"date":"2026-08-18T09:12:42","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T09:12:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=5479"},"modified":"2026-08-18T09:12:42","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T09:12:42","slug":"awss-asia-chief-is-relocating-to-japan-as-the-country-scrambles-to-modernize-its-legacy-it-systems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=5479","title":{"rendered":"AWS\u2019s Asia chief is relocating to Japan as the country scrambles to modernize its legacy IT systems"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cJapan is in a moment of change,\u201d Jaime Valles, AWS\u2019 managing director of Asia-Pacific, Japan and China, tells Fortune<\/em> at the firm\u2019s Singapore office. \u201cAI, security and competition are three strong reasons for Japanese companies to move from a traditional mainframe-based platform to the cloud.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Japan\u2019s government has warned that a failure to modernize the country\u2019s IT systems, which it dubs a looming \u201cdigital cliff,\u201d could cost the economy as much as $76 billion each year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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The country was once a global pioneer in technological innovation, playing a leading role in the spread of technologies like LEDs, lithium-ion batteries, and notebook computers. But Japan\u2019s corporate culture shifted to reward caution over disruptive innovation, a trend that the World Economic Forum attributes to a cultural aversion to failure and risk.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe technology posture Japan has today is still very based on traditional, legacy on-premise technology,\u201d Valles says. \u201cEven if you go deep into Japan, most of the support, enablement, applications and technology is run by four local companies: Hitachi, NEC, Fujitsu and NTT Data.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet this conservative mindset has caused Japan to fall behind its peers in reaping the benefits of the AI boom. China has pulled forward in the development of humanoid robots and frontier open-source AI models, while Taiwan and South Korea\u2019s chipmakers have entrenched themselves in global AI hardware supply chains. While Japan lags on manufacturing advanced logic chips, it is still a major manufacturer of legacy and specialized automotive chips, as well as materials and equipment.<\/p>\n

Last year, Japan began a push to reboot its innovation engine with a plan to channel $2.3 trillion in public and private investment to 17 strategic sectors by 2040. Semiconductors will get the largest share of the money, receiving $426 billion. Around $66 billion will go to physical AI, a catch-all term that includes robotics and autonomous systems. <\/p>\n

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\u201cWith AI development moving so fast, Japan can\u2019t afford to fall behind,\u201d the country\u2019s digital minister, Hisashi Matsumoto, said during a press briefing last June. \u201cI hope many Japanese people understand that we need to press ahead with AI development, or we\u2019ll end up becoming an AI colony.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Valles, that renewed technological push creates an opportunity for cloud providers to drive digital transformation among local companies. \u201cAI allows individuals to make their ideas happen without support from anyone, as long as they have the right data platform, security posture, and reliable systems\u2014all of which we provide,\u201d he says. \u201cWith that in place, you\u2019re going to have new ideas from multiple people within companies.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u2018Build something from zero\u2019<\/h2>\n

Before moving to Asia, Valles spent close to a decade building up AWS\u2019s business in Latin America from a small office in Brazil. \u201cAWS Latin America did not exist,\u201d Valles says. \u201cThere was an opportunity to build something from zero, and actually try new ideas.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Under his leadership, AWS opened several edge locations, or secure connections to the global AWS network, in Argentina, Chile and Colombia. In 2022, the firm also announced plans to open 30 new \u201cAWS Local Zones,\u201d which offer infrastructure, storage and database services.<\/p>\n

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At the core of his leadership playbook is a commitment to hiring people who are \u201cbigger and better\u201d than him, and being humble enough to let them experiment and innovate.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe regions are different but at the end of the day, people are people, and culture is culture,\u201d Valles explains. \u201cIt\u2019s about bringing on the best leaders, listening to them, and having a mindset that allows you to continuously learn from them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Land of innovation\u2019<\/h2>\n

Valles moved to Singapore in 2023 when he was tapped to lead AWS\u2019 operations in the APAC region. He\u2019s bullish on the region, touting it as the \u201cland of innovation\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my view, the future is going to be built and exported from Asia,\u201d Valles tells Fortune<\/em>. \u201cThat\u2019s for multiple reasons, including the region\u2019s diversity, the learning agility of its people, its mix of developing and developed nations, and its continuous drive for innovation.\u201d<\/p>\n

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AWS is investing in the region, adding four new data center clusters in Malaysia, Thailand, New Zealand, and Taiwan over the last 18 months.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision to invest in each of these regions was driven by customer feedback,\u201d Valles explains. \u201cWe\u2019re hearing from local governments and companies that they need computing power to drive innovation in education, health and other domains.\u201d He adds that with more companies moving from AI training to inference, users require cloud regions close by to reduce latencies and delays in operations.<\/p>\n

AWS is also rolling out localized initiatives tailored to users in each Asian market. In India, for instance, where software engineering is a core tenet of the economy, AWS has focused its efforts on uplifting developers. Last August, it launched the AI-driven development life cycle (AI-DLC) methodology in Bengaluru to support local developers.<\/p>\n

The firm also works to provide adequate enterprise support for local businesses. \u201cWe have Japanese language enterprise support to help our Japanese customers in mission critical applications,\u201d Valles says, adding that in Japan, one or two minutes of downtime would \u201calready require an apology from the CEO\u201d.<\/p>\n

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At the heart of it all, Valles remains an AI optimist. \u201cWe\u2019re at such an inflection point in the industry,\u201d he concludes. \u201cI\u2019m totally convinced that AI is going to allow us to build a new future, and completely transform everything that we see.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Last year, Japan began a push to reboot its innovation engine with a plan to channel $2.3 trillion in investments to 17 strategic sectors by 2040. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5478,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aws"],"yoast_head":"\nAWS\u2019s Asia chief is relocating to Japan as the country scrambles to modernize its legacy IT systems - Cross Country Moving Team<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=5479\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"AWS\u2019s Asia chief is relocating to Japan as the country scrambles to modernize its legacy IT systems - 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