DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — At the 2026 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Dr. Giovanni Caforio, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Novartis, announced a major new partnership: the Novartis Foundation, the Ministry of Health of Brunei Darussalam, and EVYD Technology will jointly implement an AI- and data-enabled national cardiovascular disease prevention initiative under the global program: CARDIO4Cities.

Built on Brunei’s national health platform, the program aims to harness population-scale data and artificial intelligence to enable early identification of high-risk individuals and deliver targeted interventions, ultimately reducing cardiovascular disease burden and strengthening national heart health outcomes.

This landmark collaboration, recognized for both its public health impact and innovation potential, has been prominently featured by the World Economic Forum.

Advancing Public Health Through AI and Cross-Sector Collaboration

The initiative was highlighted during the Davos session “Innovating for Social Impact at Scale Through Partnerships and Artificial Intelligence,” co-hosted by the Novartis Foundation, Novo Nordisk and the World Heart Federation.

During the discussion, Mrs. Gong Yingying, Founder and Chairlady of Yidu Tech, joined Mr. Marnix van Ginneken, Chairman of the Philips Foundation, in a dialogue on digital health innovation and the future of resilient public health systems. The conversation was moderated by Dr. Ann Aerts, Head of the Novartis Foundation.

Mrs. Gong noted that advancing high-quality public health is fundamentally a systems-level endeavor — one that depends on whether technological innovation and cross-sector collaboration can be translated into scalable, self-reinforcing capabilities over time. She emphasized that the launch of CARDIO4Cities in Brunei represents a strategically significant national-level deployment.

Its ambition extends well beyond the implementation of a single program. Rather, it is designed to drive a structural transformation of the public health system: shifting from reactive response to proactive prediction, from fragmented services to integrated governance, and from experience-based approaches to precision management grounded in real-world data.

Addressing a Global Non-Communicable Disease Challenge

Cardiovascular disease and other non-communicable diseases remain the leading cause of death worldwide, accounting for more than 70% of global mortality. In Brunei, cardiovascular disease is also the primary cause of death, placing sustained pressure on the country’s healthcare system.

Globally, many countries continue to face common structural barriers — including fragmented data infrastructure, limited monitoring capacity, and insufficient population-level risk stratification — making precise prevention difficult to implement at scale.

Through this partnership, Brunei will leverage to establish AI-driven cardiovascular risk tiering across the population and deliver differentiated intervention pathways, shifting prevention efforts upstream.

“A truly resilient system,” said Mrs. Gong, “must act before risks fully emerge. This is the national value of data- and intelligence-driven health governance.”

EVYD’s Platform Foundation and Value for Life Sciences

The AI capabilities underpinning Brunei’s CARDIO4Cities program are rooted in EVYD’s broader technology foundation — designed to deliver population-scale intelligence while also enabling end-to-end value creation for pharmaceutical and life sciences partners globally.

Powered by EVYD’s proprietary AI engine and extensive real-world evidence infrastructure, the platform supports drug developers across the R&D lifecycle, including:

• AI-enabled precision patient identification and recruitment
• intelligent clinical trial data quality monitoring
• accelerated execution with improved cost efficiency
• generation of high-quality real-world evidence to support regulatory submissions and payer access

BruHealth: From Pandemic Response to a National Digital Health Backbone

Mrs. Gong also highlighted the evolution of BruHealth, Brunei’s national digital health platform.

Initially established to support infectious disease tracking and resource coordination during the pandemic, BruHealth has since grown into a comprehensive national infrastructure integrating:

• government oversight and policy execution
• physician-facing clinical workstations
• citizen-centered digital health services

Today, residents can access longitudinal health records, receive AI-generated personalized health guidance, schedule care appointments, and monitor key wellness indicators directly through the platform.

BruHealth now covers more than 85% of Brunei’s population, serving as the digital backbone of the country’s universal health ecosystem. EVYD will provide core data integration, analytics, and implementation support to ensure CARDIO4Cities is operationalized at national scale.

A Globally Scalable Model for Cardiometabolic Risk Reduction

Brunei becomes the first country to expand CARDIO4Cities at national scale across four major cardiovascular risk factors: hypertension, diabetes, obesity and hyperlipidemia.

Globally, CARDIO4Cities — initiated by the Novartis Foundation — has been deployed across more than 40 cities including São Paulo, Dakar and Ulaanbaatar. Results have shown that within 15–21 months, blood pressure control rates can improve by 3–6x, with stroke incidence reduced by up to 13% and heart attack rates reduced by up to 12%.

Setting a New Benchmark for National AI-Enabled Disease Prevention

This trilateral collaboration delivers a next-generation solution for cardiovascular disease prevention in Brunei, while also offering a scalable reference model for non-communicable disease control worldwide.

As the initiative advances, it is expected to further strengthen Brunei’s public health capacity, reduce long-term disease burden, and contribute new momentum to the global transformation toward intelligent, prevention-oriented health systems.

ATLANTA and TOKYO, Jan. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Mitsubishi Electric Corporation and Landis+Gyr (SIX: LAND) announced today that they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for business collaboration to advance grid edge intelligence and accelerate the energy transition. As part of this collaboration, Mitsubishi Electric has joined Landis+Gyr’s growing Application (App) Ecosystem.

Landis+Gyr’s App Ecosystem is an open, scalable platform that empowers developers to create apps delivering advanced analytics, operational optimization, and consumer engagement—all within a secure environment. Mitsubishi Electric will leverage Landis+Gyr’s ecosystem to develop edge applications and create advanced use cases, integrating with Landis+Gyr’s intelligent edge capable devices such as its industry-leading grid sensor, Revelo^®.

Mitsubishi Electric brings decades of expertise in energy systems and grid management to a growing community of innovators focused on solving today’s most pressing energy challenges. Through this collaboration with Landis+Gyr, utilities will gain tools to manage the increasing complexity of grid operations, enhance grid stability and reliability, unlock new capabilities for distributed energy resources (DERs), and foster customer engagement. At the same time, consumers will be empowered to optimize their energy consumption and make more effective use of their devices and equipment. The solution will initially focus on North America—where DERs are rapidly expanding and grid edge intelligence is advancing quickly—unlocking a variety of innovative use cases.

“Mitsubishi Electric’s unparalleled expertise—from power generation to home appliances—will play a key role in delivering advanced applications that improve grid edge intelligence, enhance utility decision-making, and foster innovation that benefits both utilities and their customers,” said Amith Kota, Landis+Gyr’s Chief Product and Technology Officer.

“We anticipate a future in which energy resources become highly decentralized, enabling a new generation of social infrastructure powered by autonomous decision‑making and control at the edge. Through our collaboration with Landis+Gyr, a global leader in grid edge platforms, we will integrate centralized system‑optimization capabilities with intelligent edge functions. By seamlessly connecting energy, assets, and data, this collaboration aims to create new value not only in the energy sector but across a wide range of social and industrial infrastructures. Through this initiative, we are committed to contributing to the realization of a smarter, more flexible, and more sustainable society,” said Soichi Hamamoto, Executive Officer (Associate), Group President, Energy & Industrial Systems, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation.

About Landis+Gyr

Landis+Gyr is a global energy technology leader, delivering intelligent solutions that connect devices, data, and decisions across the grid. Trusted by more than 3,500 utilities worldwide, we transform traditional devices into intelligent, networked sensors, giving utilities real-time grid visibility and system control. With these combined insights, electric, gas, and water companies can anticipate demand, optimize operations, and deliver energy that’s more reliable, resilient, accessible, safe, and sustainable for everyone. For more information, please visit our website www.landisgyr.com.

About Mitsubishi Electric Corporation

With more than 100 years of experience in providing reliable, high-quality products, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation (TOKYO: 6503) is a recognized world leader in the manufacture, marketing and sales of electrical and electronic equipment used in information processing and communications, space development and satellite communications, consumer electronics, industrial technology, energy, transportation and building equipment. Mitsubishi Electric enriches society with technology in the spirit of its “Changes for the Better.” The company recorded a revenue of 5,521.7 billion yen (U.S.$ 36.8 billion*) in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2025. For more information, please visit www.MitsubishiElectric.com
*U.S. dollar amounts are translated from yen at the rate of 150=U.S.$1, the approximate rate on the Tokyo Foreign Exchange Market on March 31, 2025

TAIPEI, Jan. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Star Trade, an international energy services provider under the HDRE Group, today announced an official partnership with Japan’s leading electricity retailer, Chubu Electric Power Miraiz (Chubu Miraiz), to initiate an energy storage collaboration that includes examining an expansion of capacity up to 300 MW, aimed at enhancing peak-hour electricity price stability. The project introduces an insurance-based hedging solution backed by large-scale battery storage, marking Star Trade’s first overseas deployment of this product and its entry into the core of Japan’s energy market.

Chubu Miraiz, Retail Electricity and Gas Supply Company of Chubu Electric Power Group (9502.JP), ranks among Japan’s top three electricity retailers and supplies power to customers across mainly central Japan. The region is home to Japan’s automotive and heavy manufacturing base, with a dense concentration of production and export-oriented enterprises. As a result, it is one of the country’s most electricity-intensive and price-sensitive areas.

Chubu Miraiz procures a portion of its electricity from the JEPX spot market. As price volatility is particularly pronounced during evening peak periods, the need for effective price hedging solutions has been increasing. To address this challenge, Star Trade will provide a storage-backed peak price hedging solution, and is exploring an expansion of storage capacity up to 300 MW as part of this initiative.

The solution integrates real-time charge/discharge control with AI-powered price forecasting, enabling targeted hedging operations during periods of anticipated price spikes. By doing so, it allows Chubu Miraiz to mitigate spot market procurement, among other exposures, while allowing Star Trade to partially stabilize returns from its storage assets through structured agreements.

Star Trade is responsible for leading the transaction structure design and strategy execution, combining HDRE Group’s energy storage infrastructure with its proprietary AI pricing models. The offering builds on a proven framework previously implemented by Star Trade in the Australian market and is now being successfully adapted for Japan.

The collaboration represents a key milestone for Star Trade, marking the company’s first commercial deployment of an insurance-based energy solution in Japan and its first adoption by a corporate customer. Building on experience from international markets, the project highlights Star Trade’s ability to integrate asset operations, pricing intelligence, and trading execution into a unified service framework.

Looking ahead, Star Trade plans to expand its participation in Japan’s energy markets and strengthen its presence across the broader Asia-Pacific region. Through its proprietary Star Trade platform, the company aims to deliver scalable, replicable storage solutions that support utilities and enterprises in navigating energy price volatility and ensuring long-term supply stability.

—Set Against the Night Sky of Ishigaki Island, 500 Drones and Fireworks Spectacularly Celebrate the New Year—

TOKYO, Jan. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Kasumigaseki Capital Group’s fav hospitality group Co., Ltd. (Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; Representative Director: Hidekazu Ogata; hereinafter “FHG”) held the special New Year event, “2026 New Year DRONE SHOW Origins” at Hotel seven x seven Ishigaki over three days from Thursday, January 1, to Saturday, January 3, 2026. The grand spectacle combined a light display featuring 500 drones with fireworks, offering hotel guests a New Year’s-exclusive experience set against the night sky of Ishigaki Island.

The show was realized through a collaboration between VISIONOID, which produces drone performances for major domestic theme parks and renowned artists, and MARUGO, an award-winning fireworks company with a strong record at major fireworks competitions. Through meticulous synchronization of cutting-edge drone choreography and fireworks, the production delivered a powerful, immersive experience in which light and sound merged seamlessly, creating a dazzling moment befitting the opening of the New Year.

The program, “Origins,” is an original production themed around “the quest for energy,” symbolizing a “beginning” that connects the universe to the future. In the finale, fireworks were launched alongside a drone countdown display. The interplay of light and flame spreading across the night sky became a symbolic moment celebrating the New Year’s arrival and was etched into the memories of many guests. Throughout the event period, numerous guests captured the show in photos and videos, generating strong interest and positive engagement across social media platforms.

FHG will continue to enhance the value of the guest experience at each of its properties by creating experiential content that highlights regional appeal and the natural environment.

Event Overview

Program Name: 2026 New Year DRONE SHOW “Origins”

Event Period: January 1 (Thu) – January 3 (Sat), 2026

Start Time: 21:00 each day (approx. 10 minutes per show)
During the event period, the show content was adjusted based on weather conditions, and on the final day, a combined drone and fireworks performance was presented.

Venue: seven x seven Ishigaki

Audience: Hotel guests

Official Website: https://sevenxseven.com/hotels/ishigaki/

SINGAPORE, Jan. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Digital travel platform Agoda today announced the open-source release of its API Agent, a universal Model Context Protocol (MCP) server designed to help developers connect MCP clients to GraphQL and REST services using natural language, without building separate integrations for each service. 

Operating a large-scale travel platform requires coordinating hundreds of internal services, each with its own schema and interface. While MCP has made it easier to connect language models to external systems, Agoda teams have made it even simpler to manage dozens of services without individual MCP servers for each initiative with its new, open-source API Agent.

API Agent enables developers to configure a target service, ask questions in natural language, and receive structured results. The server automatically inspects schemas, generates the required queries, and executes them without custom integration code or manual mapping.

To support more advanced queries, API Agent includes SQL-based post-processing using DuckDB, enabling sorting, aggregation, and joins even when underlying services do not natively support these operations.

Idan Zalzberg, Chief Technology Officer at Agoda, said, “Many teams want to unlock internal tools for AI, but writing MCPs for each one is a major effort. API Agent takes a novel, zero-effort approach to that transformation, and to our knowledge, is the first of its kind. We’ve open-sourced it in the hope that others can benefit from the same value we’ve seen.”

The API Agent is available now as open source at github.com/agoda-com/api-agent. API Agent joins Agoda’s growing portfolio of open-source projects, including macOS virtualization kubelet, a tool for managing macOS infrastructure at scale.