SoftBank Group founder Masayoshi Son is OK with being wildly misunderstood, especially in the West. As he once noted, even Jesus was misunderstood in his day.
Of course, Son, who goes by Masa, is also all-too-human. He’s hitched his wagon to some humbling investments, one of the most high-profile being his backing of WeWork, which resulted in a multi-billion-dollar loss when the co-working startup went bankrupt.
Son is now back in the spotlight and going all-in on artificial intelligence, saying earlier this year that this is what he was „born to do,” and everything that came before was just a „warm-up.” At the same time, he’s positioning himself as a savior of Japan’s beleaguered tech industry, hoping that AI will give the sector a chance to reclaim its place as a global leader.