Masayoshi Son

Masayoshi Son
Born	11 8 1957 (age 69 years old (as of 2026) )
Occupation	businessman, investor
Known for	Founder of SoftBank Group; SoftBank Vision Fund; chairman of Arm Holdings
Education	University of California, Berkeley (BA)

Japanese businessman and investor; founder, chairman and chief executive of SoftBank Group

Masayoshi Son (born 11 August 1957) is a Japanese businessman who founded the investment and technology conglomerate SoftBank Group in 1981 and remains its chairman and chief executive. He is also chairman of the British chip designer Arm Holdings.^[1]^[2] On 20 October 2026 the Forbes Real-Time Billionaires list ranked Masayoshi Son 34th in the world, with an estimated net worth of US$56.1 billion; Forbes lists the source of wealth as Telecom, Investments.^[2]^[3] In the annual World's Billionaires list published in 2026, Forbes had ranked Masayoshi Son 36th, at US$51.5 billion.^[4]

Early life and education

Son grew up in Saga Prefecture, Japan. He went to the United States at 16 on a short study-abroad programme and moved to San Francisco a year later. In 1977 he began studying economics at the University of California, Berkeley.^[5] The Verge reported that while a student he sold a translation-device idea to Sharp for ¥100 million and used the money to start his first company in the US.^[5] Forbes confirms his undergraduate degree from Berkeley.^[2]

Business career

Son founded Nihon SoftBank, now SoftBank Group Corp., in September 1981 as a software distributor. He became a director of Alibaba.com in 2005, chairman of Vodafone K.K. (now SoftBank Corp.) in 2006, and chairman of ARM Holdings in 2016 after SoftBank acquired it.^[1]^[5] The Verge reported that SoftBank entered mobile telephony in 2006 by buying Vodafone Japan for about US$15 billion, and in 2012 agreed to acquire the US carrier Sprint.^[5] SoftBank lists his holding as 1,865,511,164 shares as of 1 June 2026, and says the board credits him with the investment in Alibaba, the acquisition of ARM and the founding of the SoftBank Vision Fund.^[1]

In October 2016 SoftBank announced the Vision Fund with Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF), which agreed to consider investing up to US$45 billion as lead partner.^[6] By May 2017 the fund had more than US$93 billion of committed capital from SoftBank, the PIF, the UAE's Mubadala Investment Company, Apple, Foxconn, Qualcomm and Sharp.^[7] Forbes reports that the Vision Funds have invested in more than 400 companies. It says that in 2024 SoftBank formed a joint venture with Alat, a Riyadh-based firm, to make industrial robots, and that in November 2025 it sold its entire Nvidia stake for nearly US$6 billion to help fund its investment in OpenAI.^[2] In January 2025 SoftBank and OpenAI announced the Stargate Project, a new company intended to invest US$500 billion over four years in AI infrastructure for OpenAI in the United States.^[8]

Wealth

Forbes gives the source of his wealth as telecoms and investments. It reports that SoftBank Group made a net profit of ¥5 trillion (US$31 billion) in the year to 31 March 2026.^[2] The Verge noted in 2012 that Son had lost US$1.3 billion of his personal wealth when SoftBank shares fell on reports of the Sprint deal.^[5]

Wealth history

Forbes has included this entry in its annual World's Billionaires list in 26 of the editions from 2001 to 2026 checked for this profile, starting with 2001. The table gives the rank and estimated net worth in each annual list.^[4]^[2]

Forbes estimates by list year
Year	World's Billionaires rank	Net worth (US$ bn)
2001	55	5.6
2002	293	1.5
2003	386	1.1
2004	216	2.4
2005	122	4.3
2006	221	3.1
2007	129	5.8
2008	201	5.1
2009	151	3.7
2010	127	5.9
2011	113	8.1
2012	127	7.2
2013	128	8.6
2014	42	18.4
2015	75	14.1
2016	82	11.7
2017	34	21.2
2018	39	22.7
2019	43	21.6
2020	56	16.6
2021	29	45.4
2022	74	21.3
2023	69	22.4
2024	51	32.7
2025	60	29.4
2026	36	51.5

Philanthropy

After the Great East Japan Earthquake of March 2011, SoftBank announced that Son would personally donate ¥10 billion and give his entire remuneration as SoftBank's representative, from fiscal 2011 until he retires, to support children orphaned by the disaster and other orphaned children.^[9] In May 2011 the company said the money would go to the Japanese Red Cross Society, the Central Community Chest of Japan, the Japan Committee for UNICEF, five prefectural governments, and a ¥4 billion recovery fund for organisations supporting orphaned children.^[10]

Political activity

Forbes reports that in December 2024 Son pledged that SoftBank would invest US$100 billion and create 100,000 jobs in the United States during Donald Trump's second term.^[2] The Stargate Project was announced in Washington, D.C., in January 2025.^[8] No personal political donations were found in the sources checked.

Controversies and legal issues

The Verge described Son as a controversial figure in Japan because of his outspoken, risk-taking style. It noted that during a regulatory dispute with NTT he once threatened to set himself on fire at a government meeting.^[5] No legal proceedings against Son personally were found in the sources checked.

International and political links

This section uses the same ten headings for every profile in this series. Only specific, sourced actions are included; company-level and foundation-level actions are labelled as such. Where nothing was found, the entry reads "No documented involvement found in sources checked."

Israel (investments, operations, donations, contracts, statements)

In July 2021 Globes reported that SoftBank had appointed the former Mossad chief Yossi Cohen to run its activity in Israel.^[11] In August 2019 The Times of Israel reported a US$200 million investment by SoftBank Corp. and its affiliates in Cybereason, which it described as a US-Israeli cyber-security firm.^[12] No personal donations to Israeli or pro-Israel organisations were found.