StartUp India: SoftBank To Scale Up its Funding in India to $10 Bn

The Japanese company is keen on sector like solar and tap the potential of the Internet in India.

SoftBank CEO commits big funding to grow startup promise in India. (Photo: AP)

Betting on India emerging bigger than China, Japan’s SoftBank has said it has invested $2 billion in Indian firms in the last one year and will look to scale up the investment to $10 billion in the coming year.

SoftBank’s CEO said that Internet and solar are the sectors that excites him, but wants the government to develop a robust mobile phone infrastructure and resolve slow Internet issues.

<p> If I rescale, I will scale up. What will $10 billion become, I don’t know. If I have said that we will invest $10 billion in 10 years, we have invested $2 billion in a year. That’s over pacing and I think we will accelerate</p>

<b> Masayoshi Son, Chief Executive &amp; Chairman, SoftBank </b>

Stating that 21st century belongs to India, he said there exist huge opportunities in India. “Every market is different. I truly think this is really the beginning of Big Bang for India.”

“In the next 10 years India will repeat the growth China saw in the last 10 years and in my opinion, India could be bigger (than China).” Stating that Indians are smart, English-speaking, IT-proficient, he said, “all these things make me believe that the 21st century is this country.”

<p> We are very happy with the portfolio we have. We will continue to look for new opportunities. Internet and solar are the sectors that excite me</p>

<b>Masayoshi Son, Chief Executive &amp; Chairman, SoftBank</b>

Son, Japan’s second-richest person with a net worth of $14.1 billion said infrastructure was important and mobile broadband infrastructure was lacking in India.

<p> I think mobile Internet is too slow. More spectrum allocation to the mobile carriers is needed so that they can have better mobile broadband</p>

<b>Masayoshi Son, Chief Executive &amp; Chairman, SoftBank</b>

SoftBank had in 2014 announced plans to invest $10 billion in India over the next decade. It has already put in $627 million into online marketplace Snapdeal and smaller investments in property site Housing.com.

Its unit, SoftBank Internet and Media Inc is leading a group of investors putting an investment of USD 210 million in ANI Technologies Pvt, which runs the Ola Cabs taxi booking service.