Softbank Group Capital Ltd (SBGC), the investment arm of Masayoshi Son’s technology empire, contributed US$2 billion to last month’s record fundraising by Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing (滴滴出行).
SBGC invested the money in Xiaoju Kuaizhi Inc (小桔快智), the formal name for Didi, according to a filing with the British Companies House.
In the previous month, it invested US$150 million in entities connected to investment bank Raine Group LLC, including its parent.
THE NEXT ALIBABA?
Didi’s US$5.5 billion funding last month was the latest to be backed by Son’s company as he seeks to find his next Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴), an investment that has delivered a paper profit of about US$85 billion.
Other investments made by SBGC include US$300 million in WeWork Cos, US$63.5 million in SB Energy Holdings Ltd and US$75 million for Zymergen, a biotechnology company based in California, the filing showed.
VISION FUND
Son has been trying to close the US$100 billion Softbank Vision Fund to spearhead future technology investments.
Softbank Group Corp has said it would contribute US$25 billion to the fund, Saudi Arabia is putting in US$45 billion and Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Development Co is reportedly planning to invest as much as US$15 billion.
Apple Inc, Qualcomm Inc and Oracle Corp chairman Larry Ellison might invest US$1 billion each, people familiar with the matter have said.
SBGC and representatives for Didi did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Companies House filing did not specify if other arms of Softbank Group contributed funds to the investments, or how they relate to the Vision Fund.
The filing also showed that SBGC recorded a gain of US$1.1 billion on the sale of its stake in Supercell Oy.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day