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SoftBank is to create a joint-venture with Microsoft-backed OpenAI to market artificial intelligence (AI) services to Japanese corporate customers, as the investment firm broadens its exposure to the AI sector.
SB OpenAI Japan will be half-owned by OpenAI and half by a subsidiary established by SoftBank through its domestic telecoms arm.
It will hire 1,000 people from SoftBank to carry out marketing services to firms ranging from retailers to carmakers, the investment firm’s founder Masayoshi Son and OpenAI chief Sam Altman said at an event in Tokyo on Monday.
SoftBank will also pay OpenAI $3 billion (£2.4bn) a year to use OpenAI’s services across its companies, including firms it invests in such as PayPay and LY.
AI expansion
The move is one of the biggest yet aiming to sell OpenAI’s services outside the US.
Separately, SoftBank is in talks to invest $15bn to $25bn in OpenAI, Reuters reported last week.
SoftBank has a history of bringing US technology to Japan, including the introduction of the iPhone to the country in 2008.
Son has berated Japanese companies for not using enough AI, comparing those who don’t use the technology to “goldfish” incapable of using language.
He has appeared with US president Donald Trump twice since the November election and last month committed $15bn to Stargate, a joint venture with Oracle, United Arab Emirates-backed fund MGX and OpenAI to build AI infrastructure in the US.
Stargate plans to spend $100bn on AI data centres immediately with a target of at least $500bn in spending over the next four years.
The moves come after low-cost AI models from Chinese start-up DeepSeek have gained attention in the West, raising questions around the potential returns of massive AI investments.
‘More is better’
Son appeared to downplay such ideas at the event, saying, “If more is better, we should do a lot.”
““More brain is definitely better. Some people say you can do small – compressed – but that’s just small,” he said.
“The world is going to need so much compute,” Altman said.
They were joined at the event by ARM Holdings chief executive Rene Haas and Junichi Miyakawa, chief of SoftBank’s telecoms arm, two companies that are key to SoftBank’s AI plans.
ARM is reportedly planning to set up an AI chip division and produce prototype AI chips by this spring, with mass production beginning this autumn.
Son and Altman also met with Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba on Monday.
