SoftBank Group Corp. Chairman and CEO Masayoshi Son speaks at the company’s annual shareholder meeting on Friday, June 20, 2024, in Tokyo, Japan. , making his most ambitious announcement since the Japanese conglomerate began taking steps to shore up its finances following a series of ill-timed startup investments.
Kosuke Okahara | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Artificial intelligence that is 10,000 times smarter than humans will appear within 10 years. Softbank Chief Executive Masayoshi Son said in a rare public appearance on Friday that he is questioning his life goals.
Son laid out his vision for a world characterized by artificial super intelligence (ASI).
The CEO started by talking about another term – artificial general intelligence (AGI), which broadly refers to artificial intelligence that is smarter than humans. Son said the technology could be one to 10 times smarter than humans and would be available within the next three to five years, earlier than he expected.
But if general artificial intelligence is not much smarter than humans, “then we don’t need to change our lifestyles, we don’t need to change the structure of human lifestyles,” Son said at SoftBank’s annual shareholder meeting, according to his statement in Japanese.
“But when it comes to ASI, it’s a completely different story. (With) ASI, you’ll see big improvements.”
Son discussed how the future will have various ASI models interacting with each other, just like the neurons in the human brain. Son said this will result in artificial intelligence that is 10,000 times smarter than any human genius.
After the meeting, SoftBank shares closed down more than 3% in Japan.
Masayoshi Son, the founder of SoftBank, rose to fame for his early and profitable investments in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba. He positioned SoftBank as a visionary in the technology sector by launching the Vision Fund in 2017, a large investment fund focused on backing technology companies. While some bets have been successful, there have also been many high-profile failures, such as the office-sharing company WeWork.
After the Vision Fund suffered record financial losses in 2022, Son said SoftBank would enter a “defensive” mode and become more conservative in investments. The Vision Fund hit a new record loss in 2023, and Son said soon after that SoftBank would now turn “offensive” as he was excited about investment opportunities in artificial intelligence.
Since then, Son has largely receded from the public eye.
On Friday, he returned to the spotlight with a speech filled with existential questions.
“Two years ago, I was old and my remaining life was limited, but I hadn’t done anything yet and I cried a lot,” Son said, indicating that he felt he had not achieved anything significant so far.
He added that he has now found SoftBank’s mission, which is “the evolution of humanity.” He also said that he has found his life goal.
“What was the purpose of SoftBank? What was the purpose of Son’s birth? This may sound strange, but I think I was born to realize ASI. I am very serious about it,” Son said.
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