SoftBank Group's deal-making frenzy will see Japanese investor overachieve $10 billion India investment target soon

SoftBank is reportedly set to overachieve on its 2014 commitment to invest $10 billion (over Rs 66,000 crore) in 10 years in India’s start-up ecosystem, as the firm has already pumped $7 billion in the country so far. SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son is confident about overachieving on his company’s commitment “much ahead of time and at a much bigger scale”, according to  The Economic Times. Son is in India this week to meet entrepreneurs and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. With its $100 Vision Fund, branded the world’s biggest private equity fund, SoftBank has bet on firms like Flipkart, Ola and Oyo Rooms. [caption id=“attachment_2593386” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters[/caption] “The first time I met him (Modi), I made a commitment that we will invest $10 billion in India. Some of our guys said don’t give too (high a) number which we may not able to achieve. But we have invested over $7 billion in four years,” Son was quoted as saying by the newspaper. The Hindu Business Line on 12 April, citing data by start-up research and data analytics firm Tracxn, reported that SoftBank has invested more than $8 billion in the Indian e-commerce and internet market over the past five years. SoftBank is reportedly the biggest investor in India, followed by American private equity fund Tiger Global LLC with $3.63 billion in investments and South African media group Naspers with $2.9 billion in investments. SoftBank has operations in broadband, fixed line telecom, e-commerce, finance, media and marketing.

Earlier this year, SoftBank invested Rs 400 crore in a fresh funding round in online supermarket platform Grofers. In August last year, the Japanese conglomerate’s Vision Fund parked around $2.4 billion in Flipkart, and that deal helped SoftBank become one of the largest shareholders of the e-commerce player. In May 2017, SoftBank poured $1.4 billion ino Paytm, run by One97 Communication Ltd. With inputs from agencies