India And The US

India to race past US in 25 years; I am saying it with money, not words: Masayoshi Son

Softbank's 57-year-old billionaire founder Masayoshi Son is known for his long-term bets that look at the potential over decades........ he is betting on India to overtake the US economy in 25 years ...... Last year, I had a meeting with the Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi in Tokyo. We talked about India and the opportunities there and he invited me to come to India. I came in October last year. From that visit, we ( SoftBank) said we will make a $10 billion investment and I made a commitment for the next 10 years. Then, PM Modi asked me why don't I look at not just internet-related business, but also solar energy? I said okay. ......... he (Modi) then announced a 100 gigawatt vision for solar, increased from the last government's 20 GW target. I said, wow, that's a great vision and I would like to support and contribute to making that happen. So, here we are. ..... Like in the beginning of the automobile (industry), car accidents happened often. Regulations come, the traffic lights come and you cannot drive when you drink—all kinds of rules come as solutions to solve issues. In internet in general, there are security, privacy and many other issues. ...... Snapdeal (at least the business model) is an Alibaba-style model. Flipkart is more like the Amazon model. ....... Alibaba model is the model that I am supporting in China, in India and even in Japan. ...... I think

in the next 30 years, the number of robots will be equal or greater than number of humans

. That's my view. Thirty years ago there was no mobile phone. Today, everyone has a mobile phone. So 30 years is a big change. ...... And the number and kind of robots will be more than the kind of humans. ...... Of course Jack Ma was the guy who impressed me. But I sometimes get very excited with the wrong guys and I regret that five years later. Out of the 24 investments over the last 18 years, actually only with four of them we did minus results; 20 of them reported positive results. And aggregate return on investment was 46% annually. ...... Sometimes there are guys who are smart but selfish, unfair. ...... the Chinese economy will be larger than the US in the future. After that, India is the next best candidate that could surpass US economy in the next 25 years. After that China and India could be competing for number one. So India has that much opportunity. ..... I would like to participate in this exciting moment as we participated in the Chinese 'hockey stick' moment.