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SoftBank Group ’s Masayoshi Son has made no secret of his intent to double down on the ruddy - hot contrived intelligence industriousness . Now he ’s fundraising for his next move in that scheme . fit in to a composition inBloomberg , the SoftBank laminitis is seeking $ 100 billion to build a new speculation that would vie with the likes of Nvidia in the area of AI chips .
Code - named Izanagi , the young venture would collaborate with Arm , the potato chip design company that SoftBank spin out as a public society last year . It stillowns about 90 % of Arm ’s stockas of this calendar month .
When contacted by TechCrunch for a reply to the report , a SoftBank spokesperson declined to annotate .
Nvidia currently dominates the AI chip market with its GPU chips . But with the penury for AI processors projected only to grow — and with a bunch more work to be done to improve efficiency and cost — there ’s a absolved opening for others to compete with alternatives , whether they are like - for - like GPUs , raw approach to GPUs or an entirely unlike processing approach altogether .
OpenAI chief Sam Altmanis reportedly also in talks withinvestors in the United Arab Emirates to call forth an eye - watering $ 5 trillion to $ 7 trillion for a new AI chip project . OpenAI ’s efforts are peculiarly illustrious because the company has been lead the charge in productive AI growing , both to power other service with its GPT role model and to power its own serve like ChatGPT .
All that makes OpenAI one of the biggest client in the world right now for these chips and progress to bit one of OpenAI ’s big disbursal . Altman has reportedly met with a issue of potential investor , chip manufacture experts and others across the ball , including SoftBank ’s Son , for the new AI crisp initiative . It appears that the Izanagi project is freestanding from Altman ’s AI chip ambition , the Bloomberg report said .
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The details of SoftBank ’s newfangled project have not been disclose , include which companies would build the heart and soul technology and timelines .
Shift focus (from Alibaba) to AI
A new chip undertaking would be line with the company ’s Modern focus on AI .
SoftBank has historically made a huge part of its warm return key from its other investment funds and stake in Chinese e - commerce titan Alibaba , which has yielded it more than $ 70 billion over the years . But since March 2023 — when , SoftBank chief financial officer Yoshimitsu Goto saidthat the companionship was “ get ready to go on the offensive with the AI revolution on the horizon ” — it ’s been bit by bit selling off parts of its stake to reinvest the moneyinto AI .
The move into AI may have been characterize as offensive go by Goto ’s comment , but it was also defensive : It come about a year after SoftBank reporteda $ 32 billion loss in Vision Fund , its high - visibility , gamey - stakes effort to become a major player and kingmaker in the public of juggernaut inauguration .
Yet SoftBank , thanks in part to that 90 % stay stake in Arm , has seen a solid retrieval . restoration for Vision Fund in the last quarter were the highest since March 2021 , and Arm ’s shares havesoared almost 50%thanks to rising demand for AI chips . ( It helps , too , thatNvidia , one of Arm ’s customers , has a stakein the chip figure firm , a disclosure that head to a spike heel in Arm ’s Leontyne Price last week.)“Arm would shortly be essential to AI,”Goto claimed in the first place this calendar month .
Arm , acquired by SoftBank in 2016 for $ 32 billion , list on Nasdaq in September 2023 , with theIPO evaluate the British crisp design company at $ 64 billion .
sleeve ’s client , in addition to Nvidia , let in smartphone manufacturer and micro chip designers , includingApple , Google , Microsoft , and Amazonin the designing and surgical process of magnanimous oral communication model .
SoftBank posted its first quarterly net profit for the tail that cease December 31 , 2023 , closely three year after four straight losses , help by gain at its Vision Fund . plowshare of SoftBank closed 2.8 % gamy on Monday after Son ’s AI chip project news broke on Saturday .
Arm ’s gain are SoftBank ’s addition
