In April 2025, GovTechTokyo launched the AI (Artificial Intelligence) and Digital Innovation Office with a simple yet ambitious mission: to harness the power of technology to increase employees’ “you time” — the time they can spend on what truly matters — and to turn “what couldn’t be done” into “what can be done.”

We’re not simply deploying tools, but working together with frontline staff to uncover challenges, co-create solutions, and share successful approaches across Tokyo and beyond.

This blog outlines our current project — developing a Generative AI Platform — and highlights our upcoming goals.

Building a Generative AI Platform with and for Public Servants

During 2024, GovTechTokyo collaborated with 20 municipalities across Tokyo to pilot generative AI in public sector settings. These experiments revealed a key insight: for AI to be truly useful, it needs a clear “Usage Design” tailored to the public sector.

To address this, we’re now developing a Generative AI Platform that enables the safe, secure, and effective use of AI by employees of Tokyo Metropolitan Government (TMG) and other municipalities within Tokyo. Full-scale deployment is planned for 2026, and this year, we’re refining the platform through hands-on trials and direct feedback from frontline staff.

Key Learnings So Far

One key lesson: simply writing a prompt isn’t enough to get meaningful results. That’s why we’re incorporating:

• RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) to improve accuracy by referencing existing documents.
• Long-context support to handle lengthy or complex texts.
• Security design to comply with public sector security standards.

These features are helping us build a platform that delivers real value in everyday public sector operations.

What We’re Doing Now

We’ve adopted a “dogfooding” approach — using our own Generative AI Platform daily to generate practical use cases and refine its features.

We’re also launching trial deployments at TMG and municipalities across Tokyo. These aren’t just technical pilots, but they include: 

• Soft elements such as prompt writing support and hands-on training
• Hard elements, such as infrastructure setup and security compliance.

Together, these efforts aim to deliver quick wins.

Beyond Generative AI: Driving Public Sector Innovation

Our focus isn’t limited to generative AI. We’re also experimenting with advanced technologies like:

• Devin (AI software engineer)
• Cursor (AI code editor)
• Windsurf (AI integrated development environment)

These tools help small development teams work more efficiently, improving speed and quality of service delivery.

We’re also closely monitoring Model Context Protocol (MCP), which facilitates integration across different AI tools.

What’s Next: Thematic Areas for Exploration

Looking ahead, we’re exploring AI implementation in several key areas:

• Advanced Document Management: Converting paper/PDF materials into machine-readable formats; improving searchability of non-text data such as architectural drawings. 
• Business Process Innovation: Enhancing review efficiency and consistency with specialised AI models; utilising APIs (Application Programming Interface) for up-to-date data access and supporting decision-making through AI agents. 
• Multimodal AI Applications: Combining text, images and audio; detecting anomalies in site photos; and exploring robotics collaboration for on-site support.

Our goal is to build an environment where any non-technical employee can utilise these technologies to expand their capabilities.

Making Cutting-edge Technologies Useful On-site

With the rapid evolution of ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and the emergence of domestic LLMs (Large Language Models), the possibilities are expanding daily. However, our commitment remains clear: to introduce these technologies in forms that are genuinely useful on the ground.

We are solving frontline challenges in the public sector with innovative technologies.  2024 was a phase of verification. In 2025, we’re accelerating social implementations to scale a new model that supports the future of the public sector. To follow our work, visit our GovTechTokyo website.