Softbanks’s CEO Masayoshi Son is creating a mechanism to increase their funding ability from 10 trillion yen to 20 trillion yen to 100 trillion yen. The funds will probably have invested in at least 1,000 [unicorn] companies within 10 years.
According to Nikkei, all the Vision Funds are expected to chiefly target unicorns — aka tech startups that haven’t gone public yet but have an estimated valuation above $1BN.
The average scale of investment by the funds is likely to reach about $888 million, it said.
Softbank seems to be looking to tap into about 5% of the sovereign wealth funds.
Assets under management of SWFs increased for the fifth year running in 2013 to a record $5.78 trillion. There was an additional $7.2 trillion held in other sovereign investment vehicles, such as pension reserve funds, development funds and state-owned corporations’ funds and $8.1 trillion in other official foreign exchange reserves. Taken together, governments of SWFs, largely those in emerging economies, have access to a pool of funds totaling $20 trillion.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.