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SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son has dropped his biggest hint yet about the future leadership of the technology conglomerate he started more than 40 years ago and through which he has placed massive bets on the future of artificial intelligence.
Son, who indicated he had the drive to stay in charge for another 10 years, said his successor was someone already working beside him within SoftBank.
“Deciding when to declare these two, three or four people are candidates is a matter of timing, and I wouldn’t want them getting overconfident or acting entitled. I also still have the desire to stay on a bit longer, so it’s about managing that delicate balance,” said Son at the group’s annual meeting in Tokyo on Friday.
“If I ever feel that I’m actually becoming an obstacle to the company’s growth, then of course I think I should hand over leadership to the next person,” he said.
Son then referred to Junichi Miyakawa, the head of SoftBank Corp, the group’s listed telecoms unit, as someone doing an “extremely good job” and in whom he placed great trust.
People close to the group denied it was an indication that Miyakawa was in line for the top job. Instead, they said he was given as an example of how Son had already entrusted someone with one key part of the business.
The question of who will take over from the SoftBank founder has long been key to investors. Son has gone through numerous lieutenants over the years whom many analysts and investors had assumed to be in the running for the top job.
They include Rajeev Misra, who led the group’s tech-focused Vision Funds; former Sprint chief executive Marcelo Claure; and Katsunori Sago, chief strategy officer and former Goldman Sachs executive.
Nikesh Arora, a former Google executive, was another of Son’s potential heirs who walked away from the group after the SoftBank founder decided to remain in place.
SoftBank Group’s shares closed up 2.5 per cent on Friday as the benchmark Nikkei 225 index rose 1.5 per cent.
Son has been raising his bets on AI over the past few years, buying start-ups and companies that can sit alongside chip designer Arm within SoftBank’s portfolio. The group is also looking to invest ever larger sums to deploy into infrastructure.
Son has already pledged to raise $100bn for the Stargate project to scale up US data centres and AI infrastructure with Oracle, Abu Dhabi’s MGX and OpenAI, into which he has also invested large sums of money.
“In a few years’ time, OpenAI is ready for an IPO and the structure for them to become a listed company is being discussed and prepared,” Son said on Friday.
The SoftBank chief is also pushing the idea of a vast $1tn AI and robotics complex in the US state of Arizona that could include the establishment of a free-trade zone and the involvement of the world’s biggest chipmaker, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.