Skip to main content

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son says he wants to invest in either Uber or Lyft



SoftBank has been heavily linked with an investment in Uber in recent weeks, and today CEO Masayoshi Son confirmed his interest in pursuing a deal. However, in a twist, Son said that SoftBank is also considering buying into Uber’s arch-enemy in the U.S., Lyft, instead.

Speaking to investors following the announcement of SoftBank’s Q1 2017 earnings, Son was candid about SoftBank’s desire to back a horse in the U.S. ride-sharing space. While it is the largest investor in Didi Chuxing (China), Ola (India), Grab (Southeast Asia) and 99 (Latin America), it doesn’t yet have representation in North America.

“We are interested in discussing with Uber, [but] we are also interested in discussing with Lyft,” Son said during a Q&A session. “We haven’t decided which way, but [the] U.S. is a very big market — it’s [the] most important market — so we are definitely very much interested in the U.S. market. Whether we decide to partner and invest into Uber or Lyft, I don’t know what will be the end result.”

Lyft recently hit one million rides per day, and its valuation is rising while Uber goes through a period of uncertainty without a CEO, but still its business is considerably smaller than Uber. Lyft closed $600 million in fresh funding at a $7.5 billion valuation in April, whereas Uber has been valued at over $60 billion. Its value is less certain now. Reports indicate, however, that SoftBank may do business at a lower valuation, and involve secondary share sales.

For all that talk it doesn’t appear that any kind of deal is on the table right now. Son himself said SoftBank is “exploring the idea and we would like to discuss with both companies.”

The idea of investing in Uber, which rivals Ola, Grab and 99 but was beaten by Didi in China, has surprised many, but throw in the fact that SoftBank is also weighing its rival and there’s likely to be further confusion over the motivation. However, Son explained that he sees ride-sharing as a key global industry that Softbank can ill-afford to miss out on.


“This is the shared economy and one of the most important industries, I think the way people use the transportation and the lifestyle will be different from today [compared to in] 30 years [or] 50 years,” he explained.

“The autonomous car is definitely coming, and when that stage comes, this ride-share business becomes even more important,” Son added.

SoftBank’s ride-sharing ambition — which has been clear for some time — sits outside of its enormous Vision Fund, which is targeting a $100 billion total raise and also has stakes in huge global companies like ARM and Nvidia.

SoftBank announced a first close of $93 billion for the fund in May, but revealed it will sit out ride-sharing deals due to conflicts of interest. That hasn’t stopped SoftBank from stepping up and financing billion-dollar funding rounds for Grab and Didi already this year, with other companies likely to be on the receiving end of additional financing.

More@ https://www.technapping.com
Source: Techcrunch

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Walmart expands its grocery delivery business, powered by Uber

Walmart is expanding a test of its grocery delivery service, powered by Uber, the company announced this week. The retailer is now offering grocery delivery in two new markets — Dallas and Orlando — which join Tampa and Phoenix as locations where consumers can shop online for grocery items, then opt to have them come to their home for an additional $9.95 fee. Grocery delivery has been something Walmart has experimented with for years, starting with tests in Denver and San Jose of grocery delivery using its own service and trucks. The tests involving Uber are newer, however. In June, 2016, Walmart began a trial in Phoenix, which expanded to Tampa this March. In those locations, Walmart offers grocery delivery at five local stores per market. This week’s Dallas test is larger, with 8 stores participating. In Orlando, there are four stores involved. The grocery delivery service is available via the same online grocery shopping website where customers can place their pick-up orders — a s...
Post a Comment
Read more

This 23-year-old just closed her second fund — which is focused on aging — with $22 million

Laura Deming is not your typical venture capitalist. Then again, she isn’t typical in many ways. For starters, the 23-year-old, New Zealand native was home schooled, developing along the way a love of math and physics and, perhaps most interestingly, the biology of aging. In fact, she became so preoccupied with the latter that at age 11, Deming wrote to Cynthia Kenyon , a renowned molecular biologist who specializes in the genetics of aging, asking if she could visit Kenyon’s San Francisco lab during a family trip to the Bay Area. Kenyon said yes. When, soon after the visit, Deming asked if she could work in the lab, Kenyon said yes again. Deming’s family moved to the U.S. to make it possible, and it’s highly doubtful they regret the decision. Indeed, by age 14, Deming was a student at MIT, and two years after that — at the tender age of 16 — she was a college drop-out, having been accepted into Peter Thiel’s two-year-old Thiel Fellowship program, which gives $100,000 to young people ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lilium, a German company building an electric ‘air taxi,’ makes key hires from Gett, Airbus and Tesla

Left to right: VP of Production Dirk Gebser, Head of Recruitment Meggy Sailer, CCO Dr. Remo Gerber and co-founder CEO Daniel Wiegand Lilium is almost as ambitious as European startups come. The Munich-based company is developing an all-electric vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) jet, which it hopes will one day power an on-demand “air taxi” service, arguably making flying cars a reality. And although it’s still early days — the two-seater Lilium Jet prototype only took its first public (and successful) test flight in April — the startup is announcing a number of key hires from notable companies in the transportation space. They are Dr. Remo Gerber, former MD for Western Europe at Gett, who joins Lilium as chief commercial officer; Dirk Gebser, who takes up the position of VP of Production and previously held manufacturing executive roles at Airbus and Rolls Royce; and Meggy Sailer, who joined Lilium as Head of Recruitment in February and was formerly Tesla’s Head of Talent EMEA. (...
Post a Comment
Read more