What is mankind? It’s the primitive precursor to A.I., according to SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, a billionaire who has dominated the venture capital space ever since he arrived in Silicon Valley with a massive investment in Yahoo in 1995, one that (briefly) made him the world’s richest man. More recently, he shocked Silicon Valley by plowing many billions into WeWork, before taking it over at a $39 billion haircut. “I made a mistake,” Son said on a quarterly results call in 2019, adding that it was a “very harsh lesson.”
At his annual shareholders meeting this year, the billionaire still talked about some recent “big mistakes” but largely struck a different tone with a presentation on A.I. and its cosmic significance, complete with visuals illustrating the “Birth of Superhuman,” thanks to A.I. technology.
SoftBank is a Japanese investment holding company that operates Vision Fund, the world’s largest tech-focused venture capital fund. At this year’s annual shareholders meeting, the bank’s founder, Son, discussed his emotional relationship with tech, specifically ChatGPT, which he said has become one of his top advisors.
At the meeting, Son’s first major investor presentation in seven months, he revealed that he broke down in tears for several days in October because he felt his career had not been fulfilling enough.
“There were times when I felt a real emptiness,” Son said at the meeting. “I had a big cry. The tears didn’t stop for days.” However, he said he emerged from this existential crisis with clarity that what he “really wanted to become was an architect, to design the future of humanity,” the Financial Times reported on the investor event.
One shareholder challenged him about recent performance and lack of focus on A.I. in particular. “I regret big mistakes,” Son said, echoing his comments from the WeWork debacle in 2019.
SoftBank suffered a nearly $7 billion net loss this fiscal year, the result of losses from its tech funds, but it is sitting on $35 billion in cash after selling almost all its shares in Chinese e-commerce group Alibaba. After the shareholders meeting, the bank’s shares closed up 3.7%, their highest level since November.
‘Birth of Superhuman’
At the shareholders meeting, Son worked hard to convey how seriously he’s taking—and working with—A.I. He said he wanted to design the future with A.I., and added that he had come up with over 600 new inventions since October.
Son said he holds court with A.I. every day, feeding it ideas and hoping to get its approval. At the meeting, he described his ideation process with ChatGPT, in which he pitches an idea, gets feedback, then goes back and forth until the A.I. is satisfied.
“After we repeated this several dozen times, I really felt great because my idea was praised as feasible and wonderful,” Son said. He added that he has teams on standby 24 hours a day to receive his ideas after a ChatGPT brainstorm.
At the meeting, Son presented slides of “Evolution Speed (illustrative)” that depicted a graph of human evolution. From the birth of mankind to the agricultural revolution, the line is completely flat. Then, from the industrial revolution to the information revolution, the line creeps up a measly centimeter (that’s where we are today). But then, a few years into his projected future, the line shoots up, its slope craning toward a near-vertical line. The cause? “A.I.: Birth of Superhuman,” the slide reads.
Son’s presentation goes on to note: “A.I. will solve problems mankind cannot,” with accompanying visuals of many problems mankind has faced, including a car crash, a fire, and police tape (crime).
Further along in the presentation, the SoftBank CEO displayed a slide titled “Society without stoppage from natural disasters.” The image showed a normal city at night but with light bouncing across the tops of buildings.
SoftBank couched its new business strategy as one of “shifting to offense mode” within this eccentric discussion of evolution. The offensive strategy entails investing more in tech and developing new A.I. technologies, Son said at the meeting.
SoftBank was not immediately available for comment.
