Masayoshi Son, the founder of SoftBank Group Corp., is reportedly raising up to $100 billion for a new chip venture named Izanagi, aimed at rivaling Nvidia Corp . (NASDAQ:NVDA) in the AI semiconductor arena, Bloomberg News reported on Friday
This initiative, which marks Son's latest major venture as SoftBank scales back its startup investments, aims to create a company that enhances the capabilities of its chip design subsidiary, Arm Holdings (NASDAQ:ARM), positioning SoftBank as a leader in the AI chip industry.
Plans include a substantial $30 billion investment from SoftBank itself, with an additional $70 billion potentially sourced from Middle Eastern institutions, according to the report.
Commenting on this venture, analysts said Son “is thinking big for his next move.”
“This venture, if launched, would benefit from the SoftBank AI ecosystem we've consistently written about as underappreciated in shares, though benefiting especially from Arm,” analysts wrote in a note.
One potential issue that could arise concerns the aspect of competition. Given the common ownership and not being vertically integrated, there might be questions about whether Arm and the newly proposed AI semiconductor company could attract regulatory attention “depending on the type of cooperation they might engage in,” analysts added.