Author: Erin Griffith / Source: WIRED
General Motors, the 10th-largest company by revenue in the US, is eager to lay the groundwork for future growth by developing self-driving technology. But its shareholders are dubious of too much spending as revenue declines—it fell 5.
5 percent last year.Japanese conglomerate SoftBank has the opposite problem: a giant pile of cash but not enough opportunities to spend it. The company’s Vision Fund does not make investments smaller than $100 million, and there are only so many startups worthy of such a large check. That’s why the firm has taken a loose interpretation of its artificial-intelligence-focused investment thesis, including aspects of human needs that won’t be replaced by technology.
It also helps explain SoftBank’s $2.25 billion investment in GM’s self-driving car unit, Cruise, announced Thursday. The move further complicates the tangled web of connections among startups, automakers, big tech companies, and venture investors angling for a piece of the market for autonomous vehicles—a market that doesn’t yet exist but is expected one day to generate trillions of dollars in revenue.
The overlapping investments and alliances have become so prevalent that they border on conflicts. And SoftBank sits at the center.
To wit: SoftBank invested in Uber after it had already backed Uber competitors in India (Ola), Singapore (Grab), Brazil (99), and China (Didi). Didi, which…
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