Panasonic Holdings Corporation Group CEO Yuki Kusumi delivered an opening keynote speech at CES 2025 on January 7. CES 2025 is one of the most powerful events bringing together tech industry innovators, explorers, and leaders from around the world. Under the theme of “Well into the future,” Kusumi’s keynote signaled the beginning of a new chapter for Panasonic—a leap into the data-driven, AI-led future—while reinforcing commitments to the Group’s ultimate mission of achieving prosperity in both matter and mind for people and society.
“Well into the future” embodies the idea that, through innovations and a commitment to addressing social issues, Panasonic will lead the development of cutting-edge solutions to help achieve its core mission to inspire a healthy society and enrich the lives of people around the world. It also expresses the Group’s dedication to working alongside partners who take on challenges in a range of domains in a shared effort to create a new wave of change toward a sustainable future.
More precisely, the theme highlights the steps being taken by Panasonic and its partners to look beyond products, technologies, and services to focus on innovative business activities—including the development of green energy technologies and the introduction of circular economy practices—to help address the urgency of the climate crisis.
The Panasonic Group is committed to developing useful, high-quality solutions that have a positive impact on the world. “Well into the future” starts with making a powerful, positive impact on society through the expansion of AI and initiatives like “Panasonic Go.”
Panasonic Go is a transformative strategic growth initiative that represents the group’s commitment to innovation in a software-driven, AI-powered landscape to create new experiences for global customers and partners. Panasonic Go will propel the Group from its hardware roots to a dynamic AI-powered ecosystem that integrates cutting-edge software and hardware at the forefront of the connected revolution.
Nearly a century ago, the company’s founder Konosuke Matsushita laid out a 250-year vision—ten 25-year periods that would give the company a cadence by which to evolve and grow. The name Panasonic Go, inspired by the Japanese word for “five,” marks the fifth chapter of this vision and symbolizes our forward momentum.
To date, Panasonic has invested more than $10 billion in North American subsidiaries Blue Yonder and Panasonic Well. “By 2035, 30 percent of our revenue will be generated through software and AI-enabled solutions. And this transformation will change everything you know about Panasonic,” said Kusumi, introducing this NEW COMMITMENT as part of a Company-Wide transformation initiative for Panasonic.
Wayne Usie, Blue Yonder Chief Strategy Officer, joined Kusumi on stage at CES to explain how the company’s efforts to combine predictive and generative AI offer supply chain visibility, supply/demand analysis, faster and smarter shipping solutions, and capital savings that help customers work more effectively.
Global customer Sainsbury’s is already implementing these AI capabilities to transform operations across more than 600 supermarkets and 800 convenience stores—saving time, money, and helping to future-proof the enterprise. “With Panasonic Go, you can expect to see a lot more AI-driven innovation as we continue to create smarter, safer, and more sustainable solutions for the global supply chain,” said Usie.
Panasonic Well is a venture and business incubator within the Panasonic Group committed to building services and technologies that improve well-being for all people at every life stage, and Panasonic Group Executive Officer and Panasonic Well CEO Yoky Matsuoka was on stage to explain how Panasonic Well is leveraging a Partner Collective of integrated health and wellness businesses, organizations, and research institutions and a global partnership with Anthropic, a leading AI safety and research company developing safe and ethical AI systems, to build a comprehensive wellness ecosystem to support families.
As part of this ecosystem, Yoky announced Umi, an AI-powered family wellness coach that can help families care, coordinate, and connect to enhance positive outcomes and foster deeper connections. Umi is the first consumer brand offering powered by Anthropic’s Large Language Model (LLM), Claude, and will launch in North America in 2025.
“Today, our commitment to building safe, reliable, and transparent AI, aligned with human values, brings us together with Panasonic,” said Anthropic Co-Founder and President, Daniela Amodei during the keynote. The integration of Claude into Umi, among other initiatives promoted through Panasonic Go, marks a significant step forward in bringing the AI future to customers, partners, businesses, and global employees while remaining devoted to responsible AI.
Echoing the Panasonic Group’s commitment to sustainable development, Kusumi said: “Professionally and personally, I want to do everything I can to make sure that my children and grandchildren and yours, and future generations enjoy a healthy environment. We must balance our drive to deliver innovation and create abundance with the need to do so sustainably.”
One way in which Panasonic is addressing the challenge of climate change is through its long-term environmental vision, Panasonic GREEN IMPACT (PGI). Announced at CES 2022, the goal of PGI is to reduce total emissions across the Panasonic Group and its customers by more than 300 million tons up to 2050—a total equivalent to approximately 1 percent of current CO2 emissions globally.
Kusumi used the CES 2025 keynote to highlight a number of initiatives currently under way to achieve PGI’s high-reaching goals towards building a better future.
Panasonic HX is an energy solution that generates only the necessary amount of power and uses Panasonic’s original management system to balance energy supply and demand in response to changes in electricity and weather. The Group’s Fuel Cell Factory in Japan is the world’s first manufacturing facility to be fully powered by this combination of hydrogen, solar panels, and battery storage units. Panasonic HX is already being scaled at Panasonic’s manufacturing operations in Cardiff, UK, and will also be brought to scale in office buildings in Munich, Germany. Meanwhile, the UK’s Greater Manchester Combined Authority is working with Panasonic to explore using Panasonic HX’s hydrogen fuel cell technology for net-zero energy at select public and government sites.
The keynote also introduced Panasonic’s latest efforts on electric vehicle (EV) batteries. Panasonic is the largest manufacturer of EV batteries in North America. Further, the Group has supplied more than 15 billion batteries globally—enough to power more than three million EVs worldwide. The latest 2170 battery recently set new benchmarks for performance and capacity, and the cutting-edge 4680 battery—featuring a capacity approximately five times that of the 2170—is set to begin production soon. Panasonic is collaborating with leading global automakers Subaru and Mazda as well as Lucid and others to bring EV battery efforts to full potential.
At the same time, Panasonic’s partnership with Redwood Materials is addressing one of the EV industry’s most critical needs: sustainable battery production and recycling. The partners have established a supply chain for recycling battery materials under a process that recovers 98 percent of critical minerals like cobalt, lithium, nickel, and copper, and then builds new cathode active materials which are then returned for use by Panasonic’s U.S. manufacturing. Said Redwood CEO JB Straubel: “This is the first time this has happened anywhere in the world. Cathode has never been produced with recycled content. And Panasonic is the first to put it back into new batteries at scale.”
Panasonic is also taking sustainability into the home with OASYS. The system, to be launched in the United States, unifies existing products such as air conditioning, heat exchange units, and transport fans (DC motor ventilators). It can reduce energy consumption for heating and air conditioning over 50% compared to conventional systems, creating a healthy and comfortable space with its ability to circulate large volumes of air while maintaining small temperature differences, air purification technology, and whisper-quiet operation.
Outside the home, Panasonic’s collaboration with the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), is advancing the standardization of Avoided Emissions—a power metric to scale low-carbon solutions and products—to ensure their recognition. Peter Bakker, President and CEO of WBCSD, joined Kusumi on stage and said, “WBCSD and Panasonic are advancing the standardization of Avoided Emissions to ensure they eliminate the risk of greenwashing and are recognized by governments, financial institutions, and society at large. This work is not just about measurement—it is about innovation and disclosure and empowering customers, industries, and investors to accelerate decarbonization and innovation.”
Kusumi’s keynote speech at CES 2025 showcased the Panasonic Group’s commitment to creating innovations for enhancing the health, comfort, and safety of individuals and families while advancing solutions that contribute to a more sustainable future.
“In the keynote, we represented businesses across the industry and introduced our activities from a global perspective under the theme of ‘Well into the future.’ This embodies the idea that the Panasonic Group, in collaboration with an ever-growing array of strategic partners who share our values and aspirations, continues to pursue the realization of our founder’s vision of making today better than yesterday, tomorrow better than today,” said Alex Ikenouchi, Corporate PR Center, Panasonic Operational Excellence Co., Ltd., who was responsible for organizing and producing the keynote. “We introduced our 250-year business plan in accordance with our mission of realizing ‘an ideal society with affluence both in matter and mind.’ To this end, we have launched a global corporate growth initiative to promote our transformation into an AI-based business model, providing unique benefits across various fields, and we will share our efforts globally as we contribute to solving pressing social issues, including climate change. My hope is for stakeholders around the world to see how we are working with our partners to create a better global society and planet, and we invite them to share our vision.”
Alex Ikenouchi
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