SoftBank stays bullish on India despite setback, aims to top $10 billion investment

Masayoshi Son at SoftBank World 2016. Photo credit: @SoftBank.

Last month, Japanese giant SoftBank marked down two of its biggest investments in India – Snapdeal and Ola – by a whopping US$550 million. Its third big investment, Housing, has also had a turbulent time. And earlier this year, the man who had overseen this push into India, Nikesh Arora, had to leave SoftBank.

But if these developments raised a question mark over SoftBank’s continued interest in India, its chairman and CEO Masayoshi Son, answered it with a strong reaffirmation of his commitment. “I am going to surpass my commitment,” Son declared at an event in Delhi today, reports Reuters.

He was referring to the commitment he had made to Indian prime minister Narendra Modi two years ago that SoftBank would invest US$10 billion into India’s booming ecommerce, telecom, and aviation industries over the next 10 years. That was when Softbank also announced its US$627 million investment in ecommerce marketplace Snapdeal and US$210 million in ride-hailing app Ola.

In the two years since he made the announcement, SoftBank had already invested US$2 billion in India, Son said. He also said that Softbank would surpass the US$10 billion mark it had set for the 10-year period.