I don't know if the author meant to draw attention to "Japanese" in the sense that these people were especially surprised because they were Japanese and not of

I don't know if the author meant to draw attention to "Japanese" in the sense that these people were especially surprised because they were Japanese and not of some other nationality. But I do wonder if the Hacker-Wunderkind archetype is less well-known in Japan than it is here. I don't even think most westerners would be particularly surprised by a kid making a difference in software development because of the popular (if a bit exaggerated) notion of a young guy sitting in his garage at a computer writing crazy programs.