The founder of Softbank Group, Corp. Masayoshi Son, is all set to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The meeting will take place today (November 27). This comes at a time when Son already met Mukesh Ambani, the chairman of Reliance Industries.
This is as per a Reuters report. The report indicates that Son and Ambani discussed opportunities related to artificial intelligence (AI) in India. However, Son’s schedule today is subject to change.
This comes at a time when Softbank gained massive profit from its Indian investment in companies that went public. The most recent one being food delivery platform Swiggy, which recently went public. On its $450 million investment, the company reportedly has a value of $1 billion.
The India portfolio of Softbank consists of 27 start-ups. Out of this, the majority of them are unicorns. Some of these include Lenskart, Unacademy, FirstCry, Meesho, Zeto, OfBusiness, MindTickle, Blinkit, GlobalBees, Polygon, and ElasticRun. InMobi, Flipkart, Snapdeal, Paytm, Ola Cabs, Ola Electric, PolicyBazaar, OYO, and Delhivery. With a $1 billion valuation, OfBusiness is another company that is targeting to go public in 2025.
Should Welcome Revolution in AI, says Masayoshi Son
Meanwhile, AI is something that Son has always been optimistic about. The company is also planning to build a supercomputer with Blackwell design chips by Nvidia. The intent of the company is to build the most powerful supercomputers in Japan. Son also believes that artificial superintelligence is something that will come into existence by 2030.
Speaking about the importance of AI, Son reportedly said once, “So we should be having a big smile and big excitement, welcoming this revolution in AI.” The company has already made investments in major AI start-ups, including OpenAI, Perplexity, Glean, and Poolside. Media reports published today indicate that OpenAI received around $1.5 billion in investment from SoftBank.
As per CNBC, employees of AI start-up OpenAI have been given the opportunity to sell around $1.5 billion in shares to SoftBank. This deal, in turn, will help Softbank get a bigger stake. This deal will give the Japanese tech company a bigger stake in the AI start-up. At a time when India is also increasing its focus on AI as a whole, it will be interesting to note how Son’s conversation with the government and corporations pan out for the AI industry.
