According to reliable industry sources, at the Nvidia Japan Summit on November 13, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son appeared together on stage, where they jokingly discussed SoftBank once being Nvidia’s largest shareholder and then selling off its stake.
Huang first praised Son’s achievements, including bringing the Apple iPhone to the Japanese market. He then revealed, “You may not know this, but there was a time when Masayoshi Son was Nvidia’s largest shareholder.”
Upon hearing this, Son immediately hugged Huang and pretended to cry, causing laughter in the audience. Huang comforted him, saying, “It’s okay, we can cry together.” Huang then asked, “Mr. Masa, can you imagine what would have happened if you had become Nvidia’s largest shareholder?”
It is reported that in 2017, SoftBank’s Vision Fund invested around $4 billion to acquire about 4.9% of Nvidia’s shares, making it one of its largest shareholders. However, by early 2019, SoftBank began gradually selling off its Nvidia shares. At the time, those shares were valued at about $4 billion, but today they are worth around $160 billion.
Selling Nvidia’s shares was a rare mistake for Son, known for his sharp investment insight.
However, not only does Son regret missing the opportunity, but Huang also stated that ten years ago, he had rejected an investment offer from Son, missing the chance to take Nvidia private. It is reported that Son had proposed lending Huang money to buy out “all of Nvidia,” but Huang declined. Later, SoftBank acquired Arm, and one month after that, Son approached Huang again about a potential investment partnership, hoping to merge the two companies. However, this attempt also failed as the merger was not approved by regulators.
Today, the two companies are collaborating to build the world’s first AI and 5G telecom network. At the summit, Huang announced that SoftBank is using Nvidia’s Blackwell platform to build Japan’s most powerful AI supercomputer, and plans to use the Nvidia Grace Blackwell platform to create the next generation of supercomputers.
Below is the transcript of the conversation:
Jensen Huang: Ladies and gentlemen, my good friend. I don’t know how familiar you are with him. I’ve been in the tech industry for many years, starting with the personal computer revolution.
The computer industry has gone from personal computers to the internet, to the cloud, to mobile internet, and now to AI. Masayoshi Son is the only true innovator who has always chosen the winners. In all five of these eras, he has picked the true winners.
He invested in Bill Gates, in Alibaba, in Steve Jobs, and in the designer of Apple. You may not know this, but there was a time when Masayoshi Son was Nvidia’s largest shareholder. He has always been my benefactor, and there’s no harm in saying that.
Masayoshi Son: We can also cry together.
Jensen Huang: Please sit down. How is it that you always pick the right ones? How do you always find the true innovators? In every industrial revolution, throughout the entire history of computing, how have you managed to always pick the right one?
Masayoshi Son: I think I’m just lucky. I was born in the right era, and I met great entrepreneurs, like you. It’s about passion, dreams, and instinct. You need to progress with innovators. I think that’s what makes it lucky.
The key is that we share a common goal, and we can feel this driving force forward. I can feel that driving force in you.
Jensen Huang: I have two little dogs. I don’t like it when dogs sniff around me.
If you look back through history, you’ll see a transition. How is this AI revolution different from past revolutions?
Masayoshi Son: I think this is the most exciting and dynamic frontier technology for the future. The entire computing industry has seen hundreds of different waves, and this is one of the biggest waves.
Jensen Huang: Yes, I think from a mathematical or industrial perspective, it’s important to realize that, although AI is software, it’s a very different type of software. The software industry that you and I built is part of the tools industry. It’s a tool used by humans.
Masayoshi Son: Yes, for the first time, this new type of software, neural networks, large language models, agents, robots, are not tools. They are skills, they are tasks, and they are working. They can perform work. And the scale of this industry, this job market, is not a trillion dollars. It’s a quadrillion.
I think this is a superbrain concept that can change other species. Humans rule the Earth because we have brains. You can see that lions and tigers have bigger muscles, but humans dominate the Earth because we have brains. AI is like the brain for every industry. Every industry will be impacted by AI.
Jensen Huang: So, I believe every industry will be impacted by this revolution. Of course, what’s amazing is that in industries controlled by atoms, the scale is limited, right? Because there are only so many atoms you can move. They’re heavy, yes, but the AI industry is the electronics industry. It’s governed by quantum mechanics, and it can be limitless. Yes, and there’s intelligence — intelligence is more valuable than simply moving things.
Masayoshi Son: But I believe in this kind of intelligent management, we have no boundaries. Intelligence is extremely valuable, and we need to think deeply about it. If you really think about it, it’s a remarkable industry.
We still need to design Japan’s AI tier and AI grid. We’ll have AI factories, AI brands, AI factories and infrastructure. We can work very hard. The world has never seen such a scene. I think every factory and the world needs to follow this transformation.
Jensen Huang: So I want to ask you a question: How will SoftBank use you and your subsidiaries to look at this AI change? How will it bring about Japan’s AI transformation?
Masayoshi Son: As I mentioned before, now is an intelligent network system. We need to closely integrate and build a super neural network brain. To truly build Japan’s AI infrastructure.
Of course, Japan’s payment systems, such as Yahoo’s payment systems, can change some of Japan’s existing models. But I think it’s particularly interesting to share our resources. This way, our researchers, students, and startup founders can continue to progress in Japan, building on our infrastructure model. Now, with your support, we’ve built Japan’s largest AI database.
We can provide this database to various researchers, students, and different innovators and entrepreneurs. They can hire the best talents. This way, people will have more computing support.
Jensen Huang: So you’ve made a big bet in Japan. I want to say that in the last industrial revolution, during the mechanical industrial revolution, many of Japan’s products led the development of the entire industry. Japan was truly leading the world during that era. In the 1970s and 80s, but then in the computer and software industry, Japan missed that opportunity. But we can see that China and the United States, especially Silicon Valley, captured that opportunity.
Masayoshi Son: Many industries in Japan talk about the word “creation.” This means we truly created something real, something that exists in life. This is the mindset that has dominated Japan for many years. It means that the younger generation in Japan may feel frustrated. Especially after our bubble economy, everyone has been criticized, including myself.
For young entrepreneurs, it has been suppressive. They feel this way, and we must reignite their passion for entrepreneurship and innovation. Now we have AI as the infrastructure. We can bring the intelligence of robots to the real world. We will see Tesla and Astro Boy cartoons. We cannot only have muscles; we must have brains, intelligence, passion, and friends.
This kind of forward-thinking is crucial for us.
Jensen Huang: Yes, I believe the software era was, the good news is, it’s a whole new era beginning. Everything is starting over.
Masayoshi Son: Exactly. The industry is being reset. You can see the entire stack is being reset because the old generation of companies isn’t performing well in the new generation. That’s correct. So now we need to enter a completely new era. Japan must apply this new era.
AI is completely different from software. AI requires data, we need domain expertise. If you are an artist, you have domain expertise; if you are developing video games, you have domain expertise.
If you are looking for drugs, discovering drugs, you have domain expertise. If you have domain expertise, you can describe it in data. This data can be used to train AI models, and this AI model becomes your artificial intelligence.
I really like one thing about Japan: the Japanese government strongly supports AI. Sometimes, Japan’s regulations are relatively lenient. We also believe in this time, the Japanese government does not have controlling or suppressive ideas. This is very good news for the industry. But I think the Japanese government should provide more incentive policies. As you said, this is the reset button. This is the reset button to keep up with the new wave of the era. We absolutely cannot fall behind.
Jensen Huang: Of course, to be part of the AI revolution, you need time. You need infrastructure, right?
Masayoshi Son: This type of software, because it requires machine learning, buys a lot of equipment.
Jensen Huang: Yes, thank you. You need infrastructure. Without infrastructure, we cannot build AI.
Masayoshi Son: That’s why SoftBank is building AI infrastructure and an AI network in Japan.
Jensen Huang: Because we already have various activities in Japan. We have 350 AI-related collaborative startup companies in Japan. But 350 is far from enough. It’s basically meaningless. We must encourage young people to innovate and truly take a step forward, keeping up with the AI wave.
Masayoshi Son: Yes, my colleagues and I are discussing that we’re building Japan’s largest AI database. We will definitely offer various incentives to further subsidize robot models so that they can use them for free. Design different models and applications. You should help us in Japan and donate some money to Japan. You’ve decided, right? You have to do this. We made this commitment in front of so many people.
Jensen Huang: Every time I see Masayoshi Son, I have to spend some money. Alright, it helps everyone, right?
So what excites you most about AI in Japan? What is your dream?
Masayoshi Son: I am particularly interested in AI and humanoid robots.
I think AI medical solutions, AI general intelligence (AGI), will definitely come. I think there are many new intelligent agents now. We have Line, Yahoo, and other services, paying. We can create many specific AI agents to help Japan’s lifestyle. These agents can come from us. We understand Japanese behavior. Local cultural intelligence APIs are crucial for many Japanese websites. So I think intelligent agents, and the enterprise AI agents you mentioned, will definitely happen. I support that. I’m excited about it.
Bill Gates once said that personal computers would appear on every desk. Steve Jobs said that everyone would use smartphones. In the future, we want to say that AI personalized agents and assistants will serve everyone.
Jensen Huang: Help us plan trips, holidays, education, right? They’ll accompany you throughout your life.
Masayoshi Son: Yes, but if you imagine an AI agent that knows your whole life, our grandchildren, as they grow up, will play with iPhones at age one. Every time they see an interesting picture, they’ll immediately tap the iPhone to take a photo or use gestures to take photos. My grandchild already uses it, at one year old.
So I think in the age of AI agents, they will have their personal intelligent agents from the age of one, like a second body, growing up with you, knowing everything about your health, your house, or your family tutor. Yes, if you’re a child, specifically, yes, it will remember everything you’ve read, everything it has taught you, and have knowledge of Japan’s culture, local agents. We will have a huge and amazing future.
Jensen Huang: Yes, one thing most countries are realizing is that their national data, the data of their citizens, encodes the country’s knowledge, culture, and intelligence. This data belongs to the country, just like its national security. Every country should handle its data and design its own AI. This is very important; it’s called the National Data Security Center. Every country needs to manage its own data and let its own national data center manage its data.
Every country needs such an organization and agency; it’s part of national security. I believe that in the protection process of every different country, there must be this part. Every country needs its own AI data and needs to process its own data in AI. Of course, every company will produce its own artificial intelligence. Yes, how could a company not create its own AI?
Masayoshi Son: What will we do? Yes, you are right. The world has now awakened to the concept of AI. We must say that the national network system and the AI network system must exist. We must pay attention to data security at the national level. Now, we have built Japan’s AI road, and various services will prosper along this road, with new companies.
Jensen Huang: Thank you so much, Masayoshi Son. Can you imagine, if from today, you become Nvidia’s largest shareholder, would you want to increase your stake in Nvidia?
Masayoshi Son: We tried to increase our stake in Nvidia. At first, we hoped to buy it through market operations. We really talked about this, right? We’ve had private conversations about this. Ten years ago, I wanted to buy Nvidia.
Jensen Huang: Well, everyone wants to know what happened ten years ago. Ten years ago, Masayoshi Son came to me and said that the market didn’t understand Nvidia’s value. Your future is great. I understand that the hard road you are on will continue for some time because you are innovating for the future, so I’ll give you money to buy Nvidia. At that time, he wanted to lend me money to buy all of Nvidia. Now I really regret not taking his money. That idea was truly great.
Masayoshi Son: Right? That was the closest I ever got to buying Nvidia. Later, we even discussed merging Nvidia and SoftBank.
First, we discussed privatizing the company, taking it off the market. Yes, I really thought about it.
From now on, we will create unprecedented value. The market is so big, and the future has so many possibilities. I am very happy. Everything you’ve done will inspire Japan’s development. I also feel that everything is just beginning, and we will make a great joint effort. The industry is huge, and, you know, there are many mobile devices, the Internet of Things, like cars.
Jensen Huang: You have a fantastic data center and games, etc. We can collaborate on so many things. I’m looking forward to it. Without a doubt, he is one of the greatest entrepreneurs of all time.
Masayoshi Son: Thank you, thank you.
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