Masayoshi Son
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Masayoshi Son (Japanese: 孫 正義), (Korean: 손정의) (born August 11, 1957) is a Japanese entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist. A Zainichi Korean, he is the founder, representative director, corporate officer, chairman and chief executive of SoftBank Group (SBG), a technology-focused investment holding company, as well as chairman of UK-based Arm Holdings and US-based Stargate LLC. He is known for his bold investment strategies.
Quotes
[edit]- I review our most important performance indicator, Net Asset Value (NAV), every day without fail. NAV represents shareholder value, calculated as the equity value of holdings minus net interest-bearing debt. Our primary objective at SBG is to maximize NAV. How do we achieve this? We focus on two key strategies: evolution and multiplication. Evolution involves continuously refining our business model to offer something unique. Multiplication refers to leveraging our sales capability to effectively market and distribute this unique value.
- While evolution and multiplication are vital for business growth, it is the concept of evolution that holds particular importance for the future of humanity. Back in the autumn of 2022, I experienced a crisis of confidence, and I was filled with self-doubt. However, today, I am more energized than ever because I realized our ultimate mission: the evolution of humanity. What greater cause could there be? This mission will be accomplished through the realization of artificial super intelligence (ASI)—AI that is ten thousand times more intelligent than human wisdom. Ever since, I have been grappling daily with the challenge of realizing ASI. It feels like solving an intricate set of simultaneous equations.
- ASI is completely different. ASI will be the culmination of a network of AGI models stimulating each other to rapidly accelerate their evolution. While expert opinions may vary, my view is that ASI will be ten thousand times more intelligent than humans and realized in about ten years. The realization of ASI, which will far surpass human wisdom, will mark a turning point in human history. All conventional wisdom will be overturned. In the 200,000-year history of our species, the next ten years will be a critical juncture.
- It has been 200,000 years since the birth of humans. Unlike other species, we invented tools and technologies that drove progress. Until now, the evolution of humanity has been driven by our own hands. Every now and then, geniuses such as Leonardo da Vinci and Albert Einstein emerged, sparking new ways of thinking and driving the evolution of humanity.
- When I first started the company, I only had two part-time workers and a small office. I got two apple boxes, and I stood up on them in the morning as if I was giving a speech. In a loud voice, I said to my two workers, “You guys have to listen to me because I am the president of this company.” I said, “In five years, I’m going to have $75 million in sales. In five years, I will be supplying 1,000 dealer outlets, and we’ll be number one in PC software distribution.” And I said it very loudly.
- People usually compare the computer to the head of the human being. I would say that hardware is the bone of the head, the skull. The semiconductor is the brain within the head. The software is the wisdom. And data is the knowledge.
- The brain is more valuable than the skull. But everybody has a brain. Inside the brain are wisdom and knowledge. Wisdom and knowledge are the most valuable things in the body. I want to be number one in the business of supplying wisdom and knowledge all over Japan. But the knowledge industry is too big, too wide.
- I came up with 40 new business ideas—everything from creating software to setting up hospital chains, since my wife’s father is a doctor and has a hospital. Then I had about 25 success measures that I used to decide which idea to pursue. One success measure was that I should fall in love with a particular business for the next 50 years at least. Very often, people get excited for the first few years, and then, after they see the reality, they get tired of the business. I wanted to choose one that I would feel more and more excited about as the years passed. Another factor was that the business should be unique. That was very important to me. I didn’t want anyone else doing exactly the same thing. A third was that within 10 years I wanted to be number one in that particular business, at least in Japan. And I wanted to pick a business where the business category itself would be growing for the next 30 to 50 years. I didn’t want to choose a sinking ship.
- I think I became an entrepreneur because I have my way of doing business. Especially for high-tech ventures, there are no footprints left by anyone else. You have to think and act as you think. To do that, you have to have your own company. But if you have your own company, you’re an outsider in the Japanese business world. It’s difficult. But that’s life.
- Here we have white collar and blue collar. I said a new collar will start: that is metal collar. That metal collar will not only replace most of the blue collar jobs, but many of the white collar jobs. So when they become so smart and the muscles to move, what is the definition of what mankind’s job should be? What should we do if they replace many of our jobs? What is the value of our lives? We have to think once more, deeply.
- I predict 30 years from now, the number of smart robots, the smart robot population on this earth will be 10 billion. By that time, human population will be around 10 billion. So here on this earth we will have 10 billion population of mankind and 10 billion population of smart robots. This is the first time on this earth that we live together with 10 billion robots.
- Every industry that mankind created will be redefined. The medical industry, automobile industry, the information industry of course. Every industry that mankind ever defined and created, even agriculture, will be redefined. Because the tools that we created were inferior to mankind’s brain in the past. Now the tools become smarter than mankind ourselves. The definition of whatever the industry, will be redefined.
- What is my belief and vision for this investment? I have only one belief — Singularity.
- It is wrong to say that AI cannot be smarter than humans as it is created by humans. AI is now self-learning, self-training, and self-inferencing, just like human beings.
- Despite people’s view that SoftBank might be struggling, we continue to grow. Don’t think about the past.
- Twenty years ago, people were saying, Amazon, why is it an internet company? It’s just a retail company, right? Today, people say, oh, it’s just transportation. It’s just real estate. It’s other obvious things, with AI used only a little bit. But you have to understand this is just the beginning.
- Look at a shadow. Even within 24 hours, the length of your shadow differs dramatically, even though your height in 24 hours is unchanged. People get scared or overconfident looking at the length of the shadow.
- Today already, computer is smarter than mankind for chess or go, or weather forecast. For some expert systems, computer is already smarter. But in 30 years, [in] most of the subjects that we are thinking, they will be smarter than us. That's my belief.
- But if you look at mankind's history, people were killing each other with many battles among different tribes, races, and so on. But today's world, we don't have that kind of thing as part of everyday life. We are more civilised. So when the robot super intelligence goes beyond mankind's intelligence and they say well, fighting is not an efficient way of living, harmony is better, it's more social, so we going to live in harmony. They will think about us, they help us and they try to amuse us and have a good love with each other.
- We go and change the world together and create a better world. Better world for human living. So that excites me. What is the future, how can we change people's lives for the better? For better humanity. So people don't need to die for unnecessary reasons like having an accident, or having a disease, or having a disaster. To protect humans from all those sadness, is a good thing. Imagining those things and investing and creating a group, having great product, great solution is exciting.
- Yeah, in my age of 19 I created a 50 year life plan. And in my age of 60s, between 60 and 69, I would decide my successor and have my successor keep on running it. So in my next ten years I have to do that. But even after I find a successor and give him a baton to run as a captain of the ship. I would probably stay working with him, coaching him and as long as I live probably. I cannot forget about this excitement.
- Yes, lots of challenge, but the uniqueness is actually good. If the pack of other people are this way, I am unique. I have more opportunity. The difficulty flipped becomes the advantage.
- I may but this is the life I'm enjoying so much, that I would love to do it again. I was so lucky, I was so close to falling off the cliff. So I don't know if I can do it twice. But this is definitely an exciting life, I'm having fun.
- But I still want to support entrepreneurs -- entrepreneurs with dreams and passion. Technology is moving very fast. So if I can be a good promoter or supporter, then I would be very happy to do so.
- You know, in the past 30 years, there are three things that are important in our industry. CPU computing power, memory size, and communication speed. These three things have improved by a million times, each of them has improved by a million times. So this is a huge impact - a huge impact on technology, lifestyle, and society. But I would say, what if it gets a million times better from now? A million times more computing power? A million times more memory and communication speed? So it's not slowing down at all. I think the computing power is going to make artificial intelligence really a reality, and you know, intelligent robots, analytical prediction, all these things are happening now.
- But humans have always been the best, the smartest and the most powerful, influencing everything on Earth, but the premise is that humans have the smartest intelligence. But in the end, humans themselves invented something that is probably smarter than ourselves in many ways. So, you know, humans invented tools. These tools are used for farming and so on. But the premise is that the human brain is always smarter than the tools we control. That's why we can control them. Eventually, this tool may become smarter than we are. This means that, regardless of the tools we have been using to build industrial society, a huge paradigm shift is taking place. Everything should be redefined. The way we use tools, the way we live, the way we produce, all of these will be transformed. Every industry will be redefined.
- There are many diseases, such as cancer, that affect the lives of millions of people. In the future, cancer will no longer be a disease we should be afraid of, because artificial intelligence will solve problems that we cannot solve.
- There will always be new jobs, new stimulation. You know, humans will have art, music, entertainment, all the creative jobs, and communication between people. We will help each other. We will discuss with each other.
- I am an optimist, okay. There will always be various problems in the future. But we humans are smart enough. We always try to adapt to new situations.
- Well, we can still create things. We can still enjoy. We can still try to sell something, try to design something, try to communicate with others. This may be just a job, and it may be a job you don't like very much. But we have to do it just to live, just to earn an income, to have food to eat, a roof over our heads, and clothes to wear. We must have some income, even if it is just to live. For this purpose, many people are working, but they don't necessarily like it. They have to work to make a living. And those who have to work to live, many of them will be replaced by a more efficient solution, that is, smart robots, robots with intelligence. Well, that way we can move on to more exciting things.
- Even today, we don’t need to remember so many things because you can search for relevant information on Google. It's like a part of your brain - it becomes an extension of your brain. So we don't have to do some primitive things. We can use our brains to think more. You know, think more creatively. The brain is no longer used to remember how many days there are in a year, or what happened, nor is it used to remember what the name of this plant is or what shape its rhizome is. Because we can Google it really quickly, right. However, our brains still function in many ways. Our brains are still very active and actively thinking. The extension of the brain enables a seamless connection between virtual and reality. It is also an extension of our lives.
- But the most important thing is that to have a more wonderful and richer life, we must also compete. Competition can get more stimulation, which will be the driving force for innovation and development.
Quotes about Masayoshi Son
[edit]- For years, Son acted as a bridge between the U.S., Asia and China. He was a prime beneficiary of “hyperglobalization,” the age of borderless finance and friction-free trade.
- Lionel Barber, "The Japanese Tech Titan Who Came to Kiss Trump’s Ring" in Politico (21 January 2025)
- Few characters are more enigmatic or misunderstood than Masayoshi Son, the billionaire founder and CEO of SoftBank, the Japanese media technology conglomerate. In Japan and in western media, he is cast as a dreamer, financial engineer, and speculator — an object of suspicion who has risked financial ruin more than once in a five-decade career.
- Lionel Barber, "8 Lessons from the Career of Softbank’s Masayoshi Son" in Harvard Business Review (23 January 2025)
- Throughout his decades-long career, Son has made headlines for spectacular victories as well as disastrous failures. For a time, at the beginning of 2000, he claimed to be the world’s richest man, with a fortune worth an estimated $78 billion amassed by buying up internet startups. However, the collapse of the dotcom bubble just months later wiped out more than 90% of his wealth.
- Rob Garver, "Trump, SoftBank CEO announce $100 billion investment in US" in Voice of America (16 December 2024)
