Microsoft Research Asia – Tokyo brings together Microsoft Research’s global research capabilities with Japan’s deep expertise in advanced engineering, robotics, manufacturing, and the design of reliable systems for the real world. 

Established in 2024 as Microsoft Research’s first lab in Japan, the Tokyo lab builds on more than two decades of Microsoft Research engagement with Japan’s academic and research communities. Today, we work together with academia and industry to explore how advances in AI can become increasingly capable, reliable, and grounded in the physical world.

Our research is centered on Physical Intelligence: developing intelligent systems that can perceive, learn, reason, and act through physical systems and environments. We are particularly interested in research questions that emerge when advances in AI meet the realities of embodiment, sensing, control, interaction, and real-world variability. 

Our current research focus includes: 

• Physical Intelligence and Robotics 
  Advancing learning, perception, manipulation, adaptation, and embodied intelligence for systems that operate in the physical world. 

• Real-World Experimentation 
  Investigating how intelligent systems can operate reliably under the constraints and variability of physical hardware, environments, and human interaction. 

• Reliable and Adaptive Intelligent Systems 
  Exploring how intelligent systems can generalize across tasks, environments, and embodiments while maintaining reliability, robustness, and safety. 

Collaboration is an essential part of how we pursue this research. We work with universities, research institutions, and industry partners in Japan to connect fundamental research with advanced technical expertise, physical systems, and meaningful real-world scenarios. 

Our goal is to build on Japan’s distinctive research and engineering strengths to create knowledge and capabilities that can advance AI and intelligent systems globally.