SoftBank Group Corp. (9984) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning. I am Masayoshi Son, Chairman and CEO of SoftBank Group Corp. I would like to thank you all for joining the meeting today. I will chair this meeting pursuant to the provision of Article 13 of the Articles of Incorporation. Now I will call the 41st Annual General Meeting of Shareholders of SoftBank Group Corp. to order. We have set up a dedicated website where shareholders can exercise their voting rates or posting questions online. Audit Supervisory Board, Masato Suzaki, who is not able to attend for unavoidable reason. Please accept his apology. Please note that all questions, motions, statement you may wish to make or exercise or both should be posted on the website, whether you participate remotely or in person. We have already started receiving your questions. And you can post your comments on the website until 5 minutes after Q&A session starts. And we would like to limit the number of questions or motion to 1 per 1 shareholder. Thank you very much for your understanding. The agenda today is just as set out on Page 3 of convocation notice of this Annual General Meeting of Shareholders. The number of voting rights held by the shareholders participating today constitutes the quorum. Now I will report on the reporting matter, as shown on the screen. Details are set out on pages from 25 to 29 and also available on the company website. I would like to present you a summary video on the reporting matter. [Presentation]

Thank you very much for your attention. Now I'd like to present the matters for approval. The meeting will proceed in such a way as described on the screen. If you agree with this approach, please click on Clapping button. Now we are confirming the result. [Voting]

Thank you very much for your input. With the majority of shareholders agreed, we shall follow this approach. Proposal 1 is appropriation of surplus. Details are set out on Page 7 of the convocation notice. Proposal 2 is partial amendment to the Articles of Incorporation. Details are set out on pages from 8 to 10 of the convocation notice. Proposal 3 is election of 9 Board Directors. Details are set out on the pages from 11 to 19 of the convocation notice. Ms. Yuko Kawamoto has resigned from the Board effective on June 21, 2021, after we sent out the convocation notice, along with her investiture for the Commissioner of National Personnel Authority. I'd like to congratulate her assumption of the position. Proposal 4 is election of 3 Audit and Supervisory Board members. Details are set out on the pages from 20 to 22 of the convocation notice. Proposal 5 is revision of compensation paid to Audit and Supervisory Board. Details are set out on the pages -- Page 24 of the convocation notice. Now I'd like to present our business strategy. So SoftBank Group. What is SoftBank Group, you may ask. Especially these past 3, 4 years, many people asked me what is Software Group? Masayoshi Son, as entrepreneur I like you very much, but Masayoshi Son as investor, I don't like you too much. That's sometimes that I hear from the people. Actually, I am not a simple or traditional investor compared to the others as a matter of fact. But at the same time, it would take me a long time to explain the reason why. So that's why I tried to explain by making a short cut, saying, we are just making company transforming into investment company. But once I think about whether SoftBank Group is really a simple or traditional investment company, it's a little bit difficult to explain. And I've been a bit frustrated. How should I best explain to you what is SoftBank? What is Masayoshi Son? So here, I take this opportunity to explain to you what is SoftBank Group, and I would like to make some ideas for you on the definition for SoftBank Group. So I would say, capital provider for the information revolution. I think this is the answer for SoftBank Group. But capital provider for the information revolution, what is that, you may ask. So here on I would like to explain to you once again. Back in 19th century, industrial revolution occurred, as you know. This industrial revolution back then, there are many inventors, famous inventors did a great job. But industrial revolution did not happen only by inventors. That's how I see. Same as -- equally important as inventor, there were capitalists who actually provided the capital to inventor. For example, in Europe, the industrial revolution occurred. But the one good example of inventor is Mr. Watt as a capitalist, famous capitalist, Rothschild or the Rothschilds there. Of course, there are other inventors, other capitalists there, but these 2 are quite a good example, good representatives for this industrial revolution. Mr. Watt is quite famous, but Rothschild as capitalist may not be fully understood, may not be fully valued. That's why I wanted to give him a little bit of light here. In Europe, industrial revolution occurred. Especially, he made great investments in railway that Mr. Watt and others created this great invention of railway and the Rothschild actually provided a huge capital, taking a huge risk and provided the investment here. And also oil -- by taking risk, Mr. Rothschild provided his capital to such business. So I believe that we can call him as a very good example of capitalist for industrial revolution. And this inventor and the capitalist actually led the industrial revolution. Along with such revolution, GDP has grown as well. 200 years later, in 21st century, now we have information revolution blooming in full bloom. Same as industrial revolution, I believe that we have entrepreneurs, Amazon -- Jeff Bezos of Amazon, Steve Jobs of Apple, Bill Gates of Microsoft, Google, Facebook, there are so many companies actually established by such great entrepreneurs, which led information revolution. But at the same time, capital provider provided the money or fund to such entrepreneurs so that we were able to drive information revolution. We, SoftBank Group, would like to lead AI information revolution, which is our main focus. In AI area and in AI information revolution, we believe that we are the biggest in terms of providing capital in such area. With AI -- autonomous driving, health care, finance, education, retail, a variety of these sectors are redefined through AI. Vision Fund I, II and LatAm Fund through such investment vehicle, we have invested in about 260 companies so far. Majority of the companies are not actually making money. So such a company, we are taking risk and, at the same time, providing funds or investing in such company as a capital provider. So industrial revolution, manpower was replaced by machine back then in the industrial revolution. But information revolution, actually, AI will be the one that is replacing machinery. In industrial revolution, the main player was -- one of the main players was Rothschild, and, I believe, we would like to become the key player in information revolution. So we would like to be capital provider for the information revolution. That is our new definition or new positioning, I would say, to describe SoftBank Group. So SoftBank as a capital provider. And what is the most important indicator for capital provider? Majority of the company, actually, net income is one important indicator to measure. But we, as a capital provider, last year, we have recorded JPY 5 trillion of net income, but I don't believe this is the most important indicator for us. As I have mentioned several times in the past, net asset value, which is also very important for -- as an indicator for SoftBank Group. So out of the total assets we have less debt gives you net asset value. So this -- we -- also known as NAV. This is the most important indicator for us, we believe. And as of the end of March, NAV, net asset value was JPY 26 trillion. I think it is about JPY 25 trillion as of today. It makes changes every day. So this number is as of the end of March. So looking back 25 years, so in the past, the main player for net asset value was Yahoo! back then. And then SoftBank Mobile became the main driver. These days, Alibaba is taking a very important role. Recently, Vision Fund is taking a good lead in this net asset value. So there were 4 main phases in terms of who was the driver of our business. Especially recently, I myself spent a lot of my time on Vision Fund business. Looking back, since starting phase of the Internet, SoftBank have invested in a lot of companies. In the past, we didn't have a lot of capital as a capital provider, but in the last 25 years, every year, we record IRR 43% on a compound basis. Currently, bank provides less than 1% of interest rate on your deposit, for example. So you have a good idea how big 43% is a number in terms of return. Most traditional asset management companies' maybe IRR 8%, 10%. So compared to those traditional asset managers, our IRR 43% is great, especially when you think about making this number for 25 years. So I should be proud of that, I think. Last year -- up until last year, Vision Fund was criticized or given hard time. People may say that Masa is not young anymore, so Masa's insight is not as good as before and Masa becomes too greedy or you don't have a lot of money and you don't have a lot of hair anymore. So a lot of criticism I received. But finally, we started to see some recovery. And SoftBank Vision Fund for the last 4 years, net equity IRR 43%. So we are proud of that performance. That said, there are a lot of lessons we learned like Greensill, Katerra and WeWork and Wag, a dog walking application. I felt embarrassed sometimes by those hard lessons, but we begin to see great performance. Again, SoftBank is a capital provider for the information revolution. I keep saying capital provider. So what's the difference between investor and capital provider? They sound similar, but for me, there is a significant difference between investor and capital provider. In the last 40 years, I tried to explain what's the difference between a commercial person and a business person. To investor, most important thing or the biggest goal they should pursue is to make money. So make as much money as possible is the cause or purpose or goal for the investor. But for capital provider, what's the purpose or what's the goal? I mentioned Rothschild before as an example. For me, SoftBank Group, what's the gain? Or what's the goal? What's the purpose that SoftBank should pursue as a capital provider? What's the most important goal for us as a capital provider? For me, as a capital provider, what's the most important indicator or cause or purpose? It is to create the future. Investor make money. Capital provider create future. Rothschild and JPMorgan, for example, in the 21st Century and 20th century, they built the foundation for the future. Likewise, SoftBank Group's goal is to create future for people. That's the mission or purpose for SoftBank Group. Looking back to last 25 years, the growth has been like this. If 1994's level was 1, manufacturing sector grew by 13x, finance 12x, retail 8x and retail asset 5x. In 2008, there was a so-called Lehman shock, and the market tanked a lot. And you see a lot of ups and downs due to factors like interest rate, exchange rate or some monetary policy, financial policy and statistics. Every day or every year, the market changes a lot. And investors look at those indicators every day to make investment decisions. So those indicators are very important for investors, but for capital provider, what's the most important indicator? Because capital providers purpose is to create the future. If you look at the future 10 years, 20 years and 30 years, I think, for investors, yes, those indicators may be very important, but for capital provider, in the long run in 10-, 20-, 30-year span from creating future perspective, personally, I don't think those are the most important indicators for our capital provider. So what I'm looking at is not those indicators but the technology I'm looking at, what kind of paradigm shift those technologies may bring about. Internet, for example, in the last 25 years, it grew by 34% in terms of CAGR. SoftBank 43% in the same period. The Internet sector grew by 2,000x or CAGR 34%. So talking about creating future, of course, there are more risks you have to take when you want to create the future. The Internet company that we invested in back then, they didn't make a lot of money. So no matter how much money we invested in or capital we provided, we were criticized, not only in Japan, but also overseas. You invested a lot of money into the startups that didn't make money at all. So from a lot of people's perspective, maybe we looked like a crazy guy, but performance -- actual performance was 2,000x growth. So capital invested grew by 2,000x if you were to invest in each and every company in the Internet sector. So my point is capital provider has to take a lot of risks but can enjoy a lot more return. Going forward, information revolution should be driven by AI much more longer because information revolution just started. That's how I view the information revolution. So again, in the industrial revolution, investor and capital provider shared a vision to create the future, but going forward, in the era of information revolution, group of AI entrepreneurs and SoftBank Group share vision to create the future. In autonomous driving sector, we aim for a world with autonomous driving and no accidents. In Japan, for example, the aged people is over 65 and older. I believe the third of our population is very aged, like 65 years and older, and it gets older and older in the future. As you grow old, you may have more traffic accidents, but with autonomous driving, those aged people don't have to drive by themselves but still can get to destination they want to go to. So autonomous driving powered by AI can bring world with no accident and also a world where AI analysis eliminates fatal diseases may be a reality. A lot of diseases, conditions like Alzheimer's, AI and genome analysis are advancing to help eliminating fatal diseases going forward. In the world, billions of children don't get quality of education. They are suffering from lack of education. But through online education, AI can bring them equal opportunity. And also, we want to aim for a world of wealth building opportunities for everyone. We want to aim for a world where everyone can focus on creative work. And with AI, we want to create a world where everyone enjoys life in their own way. SoftBank Group. Is it a venture capitalist or venture capital? Well, you could say SoftBank Group is a huge venture capital. But in terms of VC, I don't feel comfortable defining SoftBank Group as venture capital. But in terms of VC, SoftBank Group is a vision capital. To SoftBank Group, VC stands for vision capital, vision capital to create a future of information revolution. To me, it makes sense, this definition of SoftBank Group is something that makes sense to me. Again, SoftBank Group is vision capitalist for the information revolution. Information revolution, happiness for everyone. It's been the same vision since the start of our business. As a vision capitalist for the information revolution, we want to make it happen. Thank you very much for your attention. Now I would like to address questions and comments posted on the matters for reporting and approval. [Operator Instructions] Now I would like to address the questions posted.

So first question. This May, you have completed the buyback program. Do you have any plan for further buyback in the future? So buyback, last year, we have announced in -- from many investors. So it was JPY 2.5 trillion, which is the biggest size of the buyback in Japanese business history, I believe. So I believe that it was well received. Share price also went high -- record high for 3 consecutive days, I believe, back then. So buyback is always very important agenda in my mind all the time and very important option. But when and how big we do buyback does require all the balanced thinking from a variety of aspects. So our financial status, our investment opportunities, like I mentioned that we want to be the vision capitalist in the -- to -- if there is any good opportunity out there to make an investment from Vision Fund. How many of those target companies are there? That's another aspect that we need to check. Of course, we also need to consider the return to shareholders. So the buyback is a very important agenda all the time. Maybe today, maybe tomorrow, maybe in 3 months, maybe in 3 years, we don't know when. But all the time, I myself, of course, is the one of the shareholders and major shareholder of SoftBank Group Corp. And I really see importance in our share price. So all the time, I believe buyback is a very important agenda in my head, in my mind. And also amongst the management, we always discuss buyback as an important agenda. Next question. What is your view on the fact that you have no other way than share buyback to boost your stock price? You have emphasized NAV more than you should necessarily do. As a result, investors, who trusted your statement, are buying the shares at too high a price. Thank you very much about this criticism. You can't raise share price on this buying back shares. Share buyback, of course, is one way to return to shareholders and love to buy back shares whenever possible. But is that the only way? I just gave you a presentation. Even though we don't buy back shares, our performance has been growing and IRR 43% every year. So for the last 25 years, every year, we grew shareholder return 43%. So performance gets better, and share prices may follow. So share buyback is it the only way to raise your price? And isn't there another plan to do that? Well, come on, I take my life at risk to run this business. And as a capital provider, SoftBank Group will emphasize too much and investor end up buying shares at a too high price. Well, again, come on, in the long run at the peak of the net -- Internet bubble, at the very highest price, a shareholder might have bought our share at the very highest price, but we want to always return to those shareholders as a pride of a business leader, return to them as much as possible. Of course, in the short term, share price go up and go down. And too much emphasis on NAV you mentioned. Other than NAV, as a capital provider, what's the better indicator to gauge our SoftBank Group as a capital provider? Sales? No. Net income? Yes, but may not necessarily be the most important indicator. Most important indicator for SoftBank Group is NAV when you buy SoftBank's shares or other company's shares. And you may borrow some money to buy shares. And as an investor, if you minus borrowing or debt from the shares that you invested in, so net asset you have from that investment, how much increase you have seen in your net asset? From an accounting perspective, let's say, Alibaba shares, even though those share prices go up or down, they are not reflected on SoftBank's net income. So from an accounting perspective, maybe net income is not the same as substantial effective net income. But in a larger sense, as net asset go up, NAV should go up. So the value that you invested in and the value that you have currently, whether it goes up, that makes you happy. If it goes down, that makes you sad. So as a capital provider, NAV is the most important indicator. As of today, SoftBank Group's stock price is about 50% discounted. But as effective potential, I believe that our potential is much bigger than the discounted share price. Of course, we have to do more effort -- make more efforts to reduce the discount level, and we need to communicate well with investors and shareholders so that they recognize us fairly. But again, I hope that you will keep watching us for long term, not short term. Share buyback isn't the only way to raise share price. And aren't you going to do another share buyback? If you keep concerned about that, that makes me sad. Next question is the return to shareholders is relatively small compared to the other company. Do you have any idea increasing the dividend payout ratio? Return to shareholders, I believe there are 2 ways. One, dividend. Yes, that's correct. Second is buyback, which I have just discussed earlier. So dividend and buyback explain the total shareholders' return. So in the past 10 years, several times we have executed buyback, not only last year, but in the past 10 years. Looking back, I believe we have executed buyback several times. So buyback and dividend, so adding those 2, total shareholders' return point of view, I believe we are quite good. That's my understanding for dividend plus buyback. That's somehow that I want you to see our shareholders' return. Next question, please. Your share price has exceeded JPY 10,000 sometimes. Do you consider stock split? Thank you for your question. Well, stock split. Well, split itself is not necessarily return to shareholders or nothing to do with the share price directly. But many investors make it easier -- find it easier to buy shares if we do a share split or stock split. Let's say, if you have to spend 77 -- well, big chunk of money to buy shares. It may be difficult for young people or young investors to buy our share. For that, we have done some stock split in the past, but stock price is one option we may consider going forward. Next question. So you recorded -- announced the highest record of income. But since then, the market cap has decreased by JPY 10 trillion. What is your mid- to long-term measurements for share price? Also I want you to provide and disclose your business forecast for the mid- to long term. So net income business forecast -- net income forecast. I actually check SoftBank's NAV every day, calculate it and check that. Just one day, JPY 200 billion to JPY 300 billion movements happen. Sometimes JPY 500 billion per day, sometimes JPY 1 trillion per day that there is a movement in 2, 3 days. So that sometimes happens. So providing the net income forecast will be misleading too much fluctuation so that it's not appropriate, from my understanding. However, some shareholders asked earlier that we are emphasizing NAV too much. But still, I believe, NAV is the most important indicator for us. And a few days ago, we were about JPY 25-some trillion, and that decreased by JPY 10 trillion or so, out of which JPY 2.5 trillion, which I also discussed in the business video, in the presentation, JPY 2.5 trillion buyback is all used and retired, the shares are retired. So JPY 2.5 trillion portion of market cap has decreased. So JPY 2.5 trillion out of JPY 10 trillion is due to the retirement of shares after the buyback of our shares. So per share, net income and net asset value is actually -- per share is increasing. NAV at the peak time was JPY 27 trillion. And as of the end of March, JPY 26 trillion. So as of the end of March comparison, right now, I believe it's around JPY 25 trillion or so. So about JPY 1 trillion has declined, so NAV by JPY 1 trillion so that the market cap can also come along or decrease along. JPY 10 trillion, that's too much, I believe, as a decline. So in other words, we have 50% of discounts against NAV, net asset value. From investors' point of view, that's an opportunity to buy. That's my understanding as one of the investors. So I always check my share price, of course, and can be -- this can be quite a good opportunity to buy. So I want you to see in the long-term period. Thank you. Next question. As a strategic holding company, how do you foster an environment to create a synergy with the portfolios that will bring you profit? Thank you. We will leverage AI for autonomous driving, education, business, fintech. Our company invests in companies that utilize AI. So naturally, those family companies, if you will, deliver synergies. Sometimes we get together for dinner or discuss future. Those entrepreneurs of those family companies get together for discussion. That alone will give an opportunity to deliver synergies. So we want to expand that network and family companies. But we don't have control of those companies. Now we don't own 51%. Sometimes, we are the biggest shareholder, but we don't control the businesses because we want to give them a leeway to run their businesses. As their -- as an entrepreneur, we would give them advice, we would discuss with them for the future opportunities, but decision makers are themselves. But again, if we provide them more opportunities, I believe that they can deliver synergies naturally. Next question, please. Yes, next question. So when you seek for the synergy with the investees, how do you manage the adverse synergy based on the fact that Greensill and Katerra bankruptcy? That's also difficult because we believe it's a good thing. So we introduced them each other. That happens here and there, but it's just about the introduction for the company. So we don't order -- we don't make any order, instruct or force them to do anything in between those 2 for synergy. So generating positive synergy can be slowly but also creating a good atmosphere and also that we don't force to -- force them -- we are not a shareholder to force those companies or the target companies to make synergy, and we don't take any majority board. We just have 1 or 2 board seats for such investee time to time. So that's about it for our influence wise. So in each project, I believe that there are case by cases. But in principle, we don't for those companies to do anything, which we cannot do, of course. And for the positive or negative, we try to -- hope to see mild synergy effect taking some time -- over time. So hopefully, we can see some positive synergy. Our shareholder has proposed a motion to amend the matter. Proposal 1, dividend payout ratio should be 30%. Another motion, no dividend at all. So payout ratio should be 30%. That's one motion. Another motion is no dividend at all. Very -- quite opposite motions were proposed by shareholders. For those motions, we'd like to come back to this later when taking votes on the original proposal. We would address them both by taking votes on our proposal first, then on these new proposals. If you agree with this approach, please click Clapping button on the screen. Well, just by accident, we have 2 very opposite motions proposed. And please take a moment to consider those motions. So please wait for a moment. We are confirming the results of whether you agree with this approach or not. [Voting]

Thank you very much. With majority of the shareholders agreed with this approach, we shall take that approach. So again, we'd like to come back to these motions later when taking votes on the original proposal and address them both by taking votes on our proposal first and on these new proposals. And the next question is about 3 directors stepped down or resigned from the Board. What is the -- did you change your mind regarding your successor? What is your vision right now for your successor? Executive Vice President is the -- from the operating point of view, Rajeev and Marcelo, as of today, they are very important executive vice presidents from our management's point of view, and they keep this job. But from the ESG's point of view, we have too many internal directors. So we should decrease internal directors. So that is why for this time, a proposal for shareholders' meeting, we have more external directors compared to internal directors. Therefore, Marcelo and Rajeev is no longer a director of the Board, but they are the executive vice presidents. When it comes to successor, this is a completely different discussion between the management. Successor is rather the long-term period vision and also most important agenda -- one of the most important agenda for me, for the company, and I always, always think about that. So the executive vice president, the title itself does not directly relate to a successor. Of course, I don't deny the possibility that they may become successor. Always -- possibility is always there. But regardless of the title or regardless of executive vice president, regardless of the ages, internally, externally, portfolio companies. So I would like to see the variety of the candidates among such areas and think about the successor going forward. Next question. An amendment of Articles of Incorporation to allow for virtual-only AGM. I would rather listen to Mr. Son's talk in person at general meetings of shareholders. How are you going to hold future AGMs? Aren't you going to use VR technology at general shareholders' meetings? Thank you very much. Talking about virtual-only AGM, time like this, for example, COVID-19 pandemic, sometimes there's no other way or you can't help holding a virtual-only AGM for those emergencies. So in that sense, we may do that again but also not only watching meetings online, they can actively participate in online meetings in terms of exercising votes or posting questions. So this function is very important for us in the future. But on the other hand, at the physical location, at the same place, sharing atmosphere in person, some shareholders may want to feel real. And that I'm pleased to hear that. And in fact, I also would love to feel the vibe of shareholders in person at the same location. So we want to provide 2 same opportunities for people who want to come in person and for people who want to participate online. So we'd like to pursue the best way for to make them reality. Next question, slow-motion MBO or the possibility of MBO that I would like to ask you about. I think there are many things could happen. But this is -- maybe I should not make any comment about this. This is -- I'd like to make no comment. Next question. Wirecard, Greensill, I saw those names on the newspapers. Do you have any idea? I would like to hear your ideas on the governance in the future going forward. Yes. Governance as a public company and also as management of a public company, I believe this is very -- governance is very important. And we are receiving many of your money and managing our business. Therefore, governance is something I myself is always very much focused and careful about and also all of our Board of Directors are very keen. And regarding -- as a very important agenda for the company, I'd like to make sure that we have full governance in our company because we are making lots of investments like every day. And as a vision capitalist, creating future is something that we would like to put the money in most. Therefore, we don't want to use -- seek for the short-term gain using financial technique here and there. That's not something that I would like to do. So I would like to make sure we have -- comply with all the rules and necessary process so that we'll be able to keep the good governance. Next question. Aren't you going to bring back the preferential treatment for SoftBank KK shareholders and Yahoo! shareholders like those program for them? And is there any reason why you can't? So SoftBank, Z Holdings, they are independent listed companies, even though they are in our group. So those kind of treatments or programs should be decided by those -- management of those companies. I'm not in a position to make a comment as the leader of a parent company. And next question. Sales of Arm. Wasn't that too cheap? Share of NVIDIA. You should be able to make a negotiation to be able to get 20% to 30% of ownership stake in NVIDIA. And what is your outlook for the regulatory approval for this transaction? Yes. Value of Arm -- I believe this is a very important company considering creating future point of view and a very valuable company as well. Hopefully, if it was doable from the beginning, I didn't want to let go. But at the same time, last March, as we see the start of pandemic, we have programmed a variety of project for JPY 4.5 trillion monetization program, of which transaction was studied there. Of course, I have some feeling that we don't want to completely let go. So rather than all the cash transaction that we sell, but rather 2/3 of the consideration will be exchanged with the share of NVIDIA. The money we have spent to acquire Arm, $32 billion or JPY 3.2 trillion back then -- I forgot the foreign exchange ratio back then, but it was about JPY 3 trillion. And now it is JPY 4 trillion or $40 billion sales this time. And 2/3 will be exchanged with NVIDIA share. And this share back then was $485 per share, if I recall correctly. And right now this is $700-some per share. So it's about 1.6x of the share price right now, 1.55 or 1.6x or so. So from the sense, exceeding JPY 5 trillion coming -- or even closer to JPY 6 trillion that we have sold. So compared to what we spent actually, almost double the value or double the amount. Many people actually told me that we spent too much when we acquired Arm, and there are many people writing about that as well. Even 300 billion people that are not going to buy, but I believe they are still very strong believer for the value of Arm. So if we could own 28%, 30% of the NVIDIA, that's great, but we always have a counterpart for the negotiation is so that the transaction terms that's already been agreed. And for the outlook for the regulatory approval, I myself believe we can go through this so that the transaction between Arm and NVIDIA. They don't have a direct overlapping business. So there is no direct competition. So anti-monopoly law related matter is not really being discussed for this transaction. Therefore, each respective regulatory approval, I personally believe, is going to be given as scheduled. So from my understanding, this project is going on as scheduled. Next question. What's your honest reason why you wanted to appoint Ms. Erikawa? What do you mean by honest reason? That's funny. Well, honestly speaking, Erikawa-san is a great entrepreneur and great business person. In the industry, she has run the business for a long time with excellent insights. And of Board Directors of SoftBank, majority of them were male and a lot of shareholders and stakeholders suggest we should have more female directors. And as you know, Kawamoto-san was one of our directors, female director. And she resigned because of her investiture for the Commissioner of the National Personnel Authority. Now we would like to welcome Erikawa-san as a female director. Regardless of gender, Erikawa-san is -- as a businessperson, she's great, excellent. Well, in the past, I didn't know that, and Erikawa-san has been a long-term shareholder of SoftBank. So she knows our company very well. And in the gaming industry, since the start of the industry, she has run the business and has been growing her business. So I respect her. I admire her. So that's why I asked her to join our Board. And she kindly accepted. So that's my honest reason why I selected Erikawa-san. Next question. External directors making dual position in various companies. Is there any issue on that? I don't believe so. I don't think that there is an issue that our external -- great external directors taking position in many other companies. So great Board directors, great management even wearing several hats. Looking at the U.S. and European countries, even that you have concurrent positions in many companies, that's also good from the sense that they can learn the other sectors' businesses, other companies' business as well. And we can also have a very great lesson learned from those external directors. So rather than not only knowing one company, I believe that's even more beneficial. Next question about governance. It's unclear what kind of governance structure you have. How many directors can feel comfortable saying no to you? And would you explain to us the governance structure, including compensation scheme? New independent directors or observers often say that from outside, SoftBank looks like Masa's autocrat rule was there. But as participate in real discussion with real management and Board members, there was a heated discussion with some criticism, and I sometimes push back the challenges and that healthy constructive discussion is good. So I would say that our discussion at the Board level is very active, very productive and constructive. As a result of the discussion, sometimes I will change my proposal or I might take back my proposal, but sometimes I will push back or try to convince them to buy-in my belief. And talking about compensation, we have nomination and remuneration committee. They get together and have a discussion. So we believe that we have a proper process in place to make governance work. In the interest of time, we will address 2 more questions. I don't see Yanai-san's name on the candidate for the Board of Directors. Why he left? I would like to know the reason why. Yes. Mr. Yanai, I'm so thankful to him since we launched Yahoo! BB, and every year, we are making a loss of JPY 100 billion or so. It was the most difficult time, suffering time for us, and he supported us. Also, he made a lot of great feedback, great advice. Sometimes, it's really difficult to accept or hear whenever I make a proposal. First, he says, no, Son-san, you shouldn't do that. That's something his first remark. So that's a starting point. We made the discussion here and there and come to the conclusion. So there are a lot of discussions we made. So -- and sometimes based on his advice that we modified or amend our proposal. So I deeply, deeply appreciate his contribution to the company. And he is no longer the Board of Director for SoftBank Group. I really miss him. And I time-to-time recall all the discussion we had. I deeply respect and admire him. But what he told me was that -- "Son-san, I have spent about 20 years in your Board. I'm quite busy person as well, so I would like to retire our step down from the Board." He has his own great company. He would like to focus on his own company, Fast Retailing. I'm not sure that was a real reason. Maybe as an entrepreneur -- I like you as an entrepreneur, but I don't like you as an investor. That's what he told me before. So that could be the reason why he stepped down. I don't know. But what he told me, over 20 years, we had quite a long time service, so he would like to focus on his own business. I think that was the reason probably. He wanted to focus on his own management in his business. That's true. And he didn't like me much as an investor rather than as an entrepreneur. So both are the reasons, I believe. So like I mentioned earlier, in the past 4 years -- 3, 4 years because the explanation could be long, so that is why I just make it short and say SoftBank became or transformed into an investment company. So I try to make it simple. But for today, I think that it was a good opportunity to explain. It's not a simple investor, but actually, we are the vision capitalist to create the future. That's what I wanted to communicate, what I wanted to explain to you today. And next time when I have a chance to speak to Yanai-san, I would again like to share this passion and also report and update him and also like to play golf with him as well sometime when we have a chance. Thank you. The next question. Well, this is the one last question, if I may. You said that you would take -- pass the baton to a successor when you are in 60s. Do you still have the same view? I said that at the age of 19 years old when I talked about 50 years plan. As a business person, I talked about 5 stages of my life in teens, 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s. And I said that I would like to pass over my business to a successor at the age of 60 or in 60s. Well, recently I started saying as sort of protection. Because of advanced medical technology, I am fully energized in SoftBank Group as a capital provider. Well, if you look at Mr. Buffett, for example, he is very old, 60, 70, 80s. He is really a very active businessman. And so I begin to feel that even after my 60s, I am still on top of my business. So recently, I started thinking about that. And maybe even after the age of 69, I might be CEO. Currently, I am Chairman and CEO. And maybe CEO position might be passed over to somebody else. But as a Chairman, maybe I might be still involved in the business. So how best I pass baton to a successor, I always think about that. But sometimes until I get to age 69, I hope to find successor candidate and start handover to him or her. Currently, I focus on Vision Fund, and as important as Vision Fund is succession plan. So I want to take it very seriously. By the way, for the 5 stages of my life, most difficult and most important stage is the stage when handover will take place in my 60s. I said that when I was 19 years old, raising capital, growing business, establishing business model and, finally, handover to a successor. So that final stage would be the most difficult stage. I said that when right after I started my own business at the age of 19. So again, I want to make SoftBank Group as prosperous as long as 300 years. So as a founder and leader of SoftBank, I want to make sure that I build the foundation for the SoftBank so that they will survive and prosper for next 300 years.Thank you. So we would like to end the Q&A session, and we want to take in votes on matters for approval. To exercise your vote, please select Approve, Disapprove for all the proposals on the dedicated website and then click Exercise button. [Voting]

Now -- I hope you finished your exercising vote. And now I will take vote on Proposal 1, appropriation of surplus or dividend payment; Proposal 2, partial amendment to the Articles of Incorporation; Proposal 3, election of 9 Board of Directors; Proposal 4, election of 3 Audit and Supervisory Board members; Proposal 5, revision of compensation paid to Audit and Supervisory Board. All those in favor, please select Approve. After your selection of Approve, Disapprove, please click Exercise button. [Voting]

Please wait for a moment. We -- thank you very much for your patience. I would like to report the confirmed result. We are confirming the results. So please wait for a moment. Thank you. Thank you for your patience. I will report the confirmed result. Proposal 2 have received 2/3 of affirmative votes. Proposals 1, 3, 4 and 5 have received a majority of affirmative votes. And all the proposals have been approved in the form proposed. And for the Proposal 1, there was a proposed motion to the proposed. And with this approval, a majority of the shareholders agreed and approved. The motion has been rejected. And this concludes today's agenda, and I hereby declare the 41st Annual General Meeting of Shareholders of SoftBank Group Corp. closed. Please let us introduce you newly elected Board members as shown on the screen. So Erikawa-san's face is also shown here, which was referred to the question earlier. And Kawabe-san, Mr. Kawabe is the CEO of Z Holdings. Ken Siegel is the legal counsel at a legal firm. And also, last but not least, the term of office of Ronald Fisher, Simon Segars, Masato Suzaki, Hidekazu Kubokawa has expired at the conclusion of this meeting. Taking this opportunity, I would like to extend my sincere appreciation to their greatest contribution to SoftBank Group Corp. Thank you, indeed, for your contribution from the bottom of my heart. Thank you very much, once again, for joining us at Annual General Meeting of Shareholders today. [Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]