SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son told shareholders on Wednesday that the company's telecoms unit is seeking a stake in Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), Japan's largest utility. The move is strategic: SoftBank aims to ensure reliable, large-scale power supply for its expanding AI data center footprint, which requires enormous baseline electricity consumption. Control over Tepco would give SoftBank direct influence over the infrastructure layer fueling its AI ambitions.
This follows SoftBank's aggressive push into global AI infrastructure. The company launched a battery business in May targeting AI data center power needs and has committed $53 billion to build 5 GW of AI data center capacity in France. It also announced a $33.3 billion partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy and American Electric Power to build 10 GW of capacity in Ohio, positioning Japan's largest tech conglomerate as a primary mover in securing compute and power infrastructure for the AI era.
For architects tracking SoftBank's stack — from its OpenAI and Arm stakes to data center operations — this Tepco bid signals a vertical integration strategy: control foundation models through equity stakes, own compute through deployments, and now secure the electricity grid itself. It's a capital-intensive bet that AI infrastructure will remain the primary capital-deployment opportunity for the 2026-2030 period.