Hello from Tokyo. This week, Nikkei hosted our flagship annual conference, the Future of Asia forum. Political leaders from across the region, including Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manetand Bangladesh's interim leader Muhammad Yunus, attended the event. The conference marked its 30th anniversary this year, and Asia's economic and international landscape has undergone significant changes over the past three decades.

Thirty years ago, I was a student preparing to leave Japan to study in the U.S., and the few years I spent at a university there -- one that welcomed many international students from Asia -- had a profound impact on my life. The Internet revolution, which gained momentum while I was studying abroad, made it easier than ever for people around the world to communicate. It was around that time that economic globalization, particularly in Asia, began to rapidly accelerate following China's entry to the World Trade Organization in 2001. When I was in Silicon Valley from 2006 to 2010 as a Nikkei correspondent, I interviewed many engineers and entrepreneurs who had moved there from Asia. The world felt exactly as Thomas Friedman described in his seminal book, "The World Is Flat."