SoftBank's 'halo effect' loses some of its magic

Greensill collapse raises awkward questions

Lionel Barber

April 20, 2021 05:00 JST

The building that includes the headquarters of defunct Greensill Bank, a subsidiary of Greensill Capital, in Bremen, pictured on Mar. 23: Lex Greensill's startup was based on an old idea. © Getty Images

Lionel Barber is former editor of the Financial Times. He is author of "The Powerful and the Damned: Private Diaries in Turbulent Times."

The history of SoftBank under its founder Masayoshi Son has been marked by spectacular wagers on the future, from the earliest days of the internet to today's unicorns in fintech, ride-hailing super apps and artificial intelligence. As SoftBank has grown, so too have the bets, culminating in the launch in 2017 of the $100 billion SoftBank Vision Fund principally backed by Saudi Arabia.