Softbank, the founder of his son, makes his biggest bet by doing the future on artificial intelligence

Masayoshi, Chairman and CEO of SoftBank Group Corp. speaks. , At the SoftBank World event in Tokyo, Japan, on Wednesday, 16 July 2025.

Kyushi Ota Bloomberg Gety pictures

Ibn Masyoshi makes his biggest bet so far: that one of his ideas is Softbank It will be the center of a revolution led by artificial intelligence.

The son says that the artificial cancellation (ASI) – the smartest intelligent intelligence 10,000 times of humans – will be here 10 years ago. It is a bold invitation – but it is not surprising. He made a profession of big plays. It is worth noting that one of them was an investment of $ 20 million in the Chinese e -commerce company Ali Baba In the year 2000 he made billions for SoftBank.

Now, the billionaire hopes to repeat this success with a series of investments and acquisitions in artificial intelligence companies that will put Softbank in a basic technology transformation center.

While the son was honest to see him over the past year, his thinking precedes many of his last rise, according to former executives in SoftBank.

“I clearly remember the first time that he invited me to his home for dinner and sit on his balcony on a cup of wine, and he began to talk to me about the uniqueness – the point where the machine intelligence exceeds human intelligence,” said Ack Sam, a former Softbank.

Softbank Big AI plays

For the son, Amnesty International appears to be personal.

Sun said last year: “Softbank was established for any purpose? For what purpose was born MASA SON? It may seem strange, but I think I was born to realize ASI.”

This may go somewhat to explain what was an aggressive campaign over the past few years – especially the past two – to put SoftBank in the midst of the story of artificial intelligence.

In 2016, Softbank got the arm of a chip designer In a deal worth about $ 32 billion at the time. today, arm Its value is estimated at more than $ 145 billion. While arm plans are the basis of designs for almost all smartphones in the world, the company is looking forward to this Place himself as a major player in Amnesty International’s infrastructure. Arm -based chips are part of nvidia ‘S systems that are included in data centers.

In March, Softbank has also announced plans to get another chips designer, Ampre computing, for $ 6.5 billion.

The Chatgpt Openai maker is another investment in SoftBank, where the Japanese giant recently said that the planned investments in the company will reach about 4.8 trillion yen (32.7 billion dollars).

Softbank has also invested in a number of other AI companies through its wallet.

“The AI’s strategy in Softbank is comprehensive, as it extends to the entire artificial intelligence staple of basic conductors, programs, infrastructure, and robots to advanced cloud services and final applications across critical sectors such as CNBC for institutions, education, health and self -systems.”

“Mr. Sun’s vision is to contact and integrate these components deeply, thus creating a strong ecosystem for Amnesty International designed to increase the long -term value of our shareholders.”

Softbank’s shares performance since 2017, the year in which its first vision box was established.

There is a common topic behind Softbank investments in artificial intelligence companies that come directly from SON – that is, these companies must use advanced intelligence to be more competitive and successful, to make their products better and their customers are happy. They can only comment anonymous due to the sensitivity of the issue.

It started with computers and robots

When Softbank “Softbank next 30 years” in 2010, SON talked about “brain computers” during a presentation. He described these computers as systems that can eventually learn and programming themselves.

Then the robots came. Main technology numbers like Nvidia Jensen Huang CEO and Timing president Elon Musk They are now talking about robots as a major application for Amnesty International – but the son was thinking About this more than a decade.

In 2012, Softbank got a majority share in a French company called Aldebaran. Two years later, the two companies launched a human robot called Pepper, which is invoice As “the first personal robot in the world can read emotions.”

Later, the son He said: “In 30 years, I hope that robots become one of the main companies in making profits for the SoftBank Group.”

Softbank’s bet on pepper eventually Flopped for the company. Softbank I cut off Jobs in their robot unit stopped producing pepper in 2020. In 2022, German Robotics Group agreed to obtain aldebaran from SoftBank.

However, the very early son’s interest in robots stressed his curiosity on the applications of artificial intelligence in the future.

Sama said: “He was very early and he was thinking about this for a long time.”

In the background, SON was cooking something greater: a technical box that would make waves in the investment world. Founded the vision fund in 2017 With 100 billion dollars in deployment capital.

Softbank has invested strongly in companies all over the world with some of the biggest bets on riding players such as Uber And the Chinese company Didi.

But investments in Chinese technology companies and some of them Bad stakes on companies such as WeWork The feelings of the vision fund were strained while moving Billions of dollars in losses By 2023.

Vision but bad timing

The market questioned some of the son’s investments in companies such as Uber and Dahidi, which were burning through criticism at that time and did not have the economies of unity unclear.

But even those investments spoke to the Son’s AI’s view, according to the former partner in The Softbank Vision Fund.

“His thinking at the time was the first appearance of artificial intelligence is self -driving cars,” the source told CNBC.

Again, this can be considered a very early condition. Uber created a driver’s car unit only to sell it. Instead, the company focused on other self -driving car companies to bring it to the Uber platform. To date, cars are not spread without a driver on the roads, although commercial services such as Waymo are available.

Softbank still has investments in car companies without driver, such as British starting path.

It is clear that the timing was not next to the son. After record losses in the vision fund in 2022, the son Softbank announced It will go to the “defense” modeReducing investments significantly and being wise. At this time, companies like Openai began to get Steam, but before the launch of Chatgpt would put the company on the map.

He said that Masa was in an ideal place, “when these companies came in 2021, 2022, Massa was in an ideal place, but he used all his ammunition on other companies.”

“When they reached the age of 21 and 22, the vision fund invested in five or six hundred companies and was not in a position to invest in artificial intelligence and lost that.”

The son himself said this year that Softbank wanted to invest in Openai early in 2019, but it was Microsoft The matter ended that the main investor becomes. Quickly forward until 2025, the vision box – which is now two – contains a stacked wallet full of companies that focus on artificial intelligence.

But that period was difficult for investors in all fields. The prices of the Covid-19 epidemic, the prosperous huge and high public and private market rates in all fields were after years of loose monetary policy and the bull of technology.

A person familiar with the company said that Softbank did not see that time as a lost opportunity to invest in artificial intelligence.

Instead, the company believes that it is still very early in the investment cycle of artificial intelligence, the source added.

Risks and rewards

Artificial intelligence technique is the fast movement, from the chips that manages the program to models that support popular applications.

Technology giants are fighting in the United States and China to constantly produce Amnesty International models with the aim of reaching artificial public intelligence (AGI)-a term that has different definitions depending on who you speak, but it widely indicates the most intelligent artificial intelligence of humans. With the entry of billions of dollars in technology, the risks are high, and the rewards may be higher.

But the disorder can come out of no.

This year, the Chinese company Deepseek made waves after the so -called thinking model It seems that it was cheaply developed by its competitors in the United States. The fact that a Chinese company has managed to work, despite all the restrictions imposed on exporting advanced technology in its place, The global financial markets shook That was betting that the United States had an unimaginable Amnesty International.

While the markets have since recovered, the capabilities of sudden progress in technology at such an early stage in artificial intelligence are still a great danger to the proverbs of SoftBank.

“As with most technological investments, the main challenge is investing in winning technologies. Many of the investments made by SoftBank are in the current leaders, but artificial intelligence is still in its relative cradle so that there are still other competitors from anywhere.”

However, the son explained that he wanted to put Softbank with the DNA that he will see Stay alive and Flourish For 300 yearsAccording to the company’s website.

This may go somewhat to explain the great risks that the son bore, and his condemnation when it comes to specific issues and companies – and the assessments he wants to pay.

Exec said the previous box: “(Ibn) made some mistakes, but he is going in the same direction in the same path, and he – he wants to make sure he is a real player in artificial intelligence and achieves that.”