SoftBank has announced plans to invest up to €75 billion (around $87 billion) in AI data centers across France, making it the largest AI infrastructure investment ever announced in Europe. The project will create up to 5 gigawatts of AI computing capacity, with the first phase involving a €45 billion investment and several major data center sites in northern France. If completed as planned, it will be one of the largest AI data center developments in the world

SoftBank is starting a new company called Roze AI that will automate the construction of massive data centers using fleets of autonomous robots and AI-tech. Building data centers now takes too long and costs too much money, so Roze AI wants to fix that problem making them much faster and cheaper This idea comes from SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son, who believes that the real future of AI lies in robots and physical buildings, not just computer programs. The company is already preparing for a U.S. IPO as soon as the second half of 2026, with internal targets pointing to a roughly $100 billion valuation

JUST IN: $300 BILLION SOFTBANK CEO PREDICTS AI WILL BE 50X BIGGER THAN THE DOT-COM BOOM "THIS IS THE BIGGEST REVOLUTION OF TECHNOLOGY THAT MANKIND HAS EVER EXPERIENCED" "THE PEAK OF THE DOT-COM BUBBLE WAS LIKE A SMALL HILL"

ARM AND SOFTBANK JUST TRIED TO BUY AI CHIPMAKER CEREBRAS BEFORE THE IPO Cerebras turned them down. The full picture, per Bloomberg: The approach: • Arm Holdings $ARM and majority owner SoftBank made a preliminary acquisition approach weeks before the IPO • Cerebras rebuffed the offer • Representatives for all three companies declined to comment The IPO is happening anyway: • Cerebras expected to price today at $185 per share, above the marketed $150-$160 range • 30 million shares in the offering • Order book was 20x+ oversubscribed • On track to be the biggest IPO of the year so far, rivaling Arm's own record semiconductor IPO in 2023 Why the strategic interest: • SoftBank has been increasing its chipmaking exposure (acquired Ampere Computing for $6.5B late last year) • Arm is pivoting from licensing-only to offering its own chip lineup for the first time • Arm shares are roughly +100% YTD on AI data center optimism Why Cerebras held out: • Founder and CEO Andrew Feldman is positioning the company as a direct NVIDIA $NVDA challenger • Technology: giant chips made from a single disk of silicon (vs typical small chips from one wafer) • OpenAI is a customer and released a model trained on Cerebras chips earlier this year

It’s worth briefly revisiting the rather legendary story behind UTStarcom and SoftBank China Venture Capital. Hong Lu, born on November 3, 1954, is a Chinese American entrepreneur. His family traces its roots to Ningbo City, Zhejiang Province，China.. He was born in Taiwan, Province of China and moved to Japan at the age of six. After graduating from Tokyo Metropolitan Jonan High School, Lu went on to study civil engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, where he was two years senior to Masa Son @masason After graduating, Hong Lu joined Masa Son’s startup, Mspeech System Inc, whose core business was selling portable voice translation devices.  In March 1982, Son returned to Japan to recover from an illness. Before leaving, he sold his U.S. company Unison World to Lu. For a time, Unison maintained a close partnership with Kyocera, the company founded by Inamori Kazuo. In 1986, the two companies formed a joint venture called Kyocera Unison and attempted to take it public. The plan ultimately fell through, and Lu exited the venture. In 1990, Lu made his first exploratory trip to mainland China. A year later, in 1991, Lu teamed up with his Berkeley classmate and Masa Son’s former Chinese tutor, Charles Xue @xuemanzi8848， along with Son himself. Together they acquired Zhejiang Yutong, a company originally founded by Peter Wang(Zuguang) , reorganizing it and renaming it Unitech Telecom (UT). That same year, Wu Ying , then working at AT&T Bell Labs, partnered with Chauncey Shey to launch Starcom in New Jersey. The company initially operated as a technology consulting firm, essentially providing engineering talent as outsourced services. Among the temporary engineers they hired was Bill Huang(Xiaoqing ), who at the time was doing R&D at Racal Telecom in the UK. In 1994, Bill Huang(Xiaoqing ) joined Unitech Telecom. On October 6, 1995, Unitech Telecom and Starcom merged in a 50–50 deal to form UTStarcom. Just two weeks later, on October 19, the company secured $30 million in funding from SoftBank. On March 5, 1996, UTStarcom China was established. By 1999, after several rounds of major investment totaling roughly $160 million, Masa Son became chairman of UTStarcom, increasing his stake to 51%. On March 3, 2000, UTStarcom successfully went public on the NASDAQ. In 2001, Charles Xue exited the company, cashing out roughly $150 million. Later that same year following the IPO, Masa Son committed $90 million, while Hong  Lu，Chauncey Shey, and others contributed $10 million, forming the first fund for SoftBank China Venture Capital (SBCVC). Brilliance of Berkeley，and with that , the wheels of fate have begun to turn.

BREAKING: Japan’s NIKKEI just crossed 65,000 for the FIRST TIME in history. Currently trading above 65,250, up +3.1% today and more than +110% in just 14 months. NIKKEI is the best performing major stock index on earth right now. What’s driving NIKKEI? - Japan Core CPI cooled to 1.4%, easing fears of aggressive Bank of Japan rate hikes. - SoftBank is exploding higher on OpenAI IPO momentum, lifting AI-related stocks across the index. - Iran peace deal hopes sent oil crashing to $92. Japan imports nearly all its energy, so lower oil prices directly boost corporate profits.

JUST IN: AI CHIPMAKER CEREBRAS JUST PRICED ITS IPO AT $185 PER SHARE, ABOVE THE $150-$160 MARKETED RANGE The order book was oversubscribed 20+ times. The full picture, per Bloomberg: The deal: - IPO price: $185 (above the $150-$160 range, which had already been raised Monday) - 30 million shares offered (also revised higher Monday) - Total raised: ~$5.55 billion - Order book: 20x+ oversubscribed - Cerebras asked institutional investors to specify the max price they'd pay, to gauge true demand The company: - AI chipmaker positioning to challenge NVIDIA $NVDA - Amazon $AMZN said this year it plans to use Cerebras chips alongside its Trainium processors - OpenAI released its first model running on Cerebras chips in February - OpenAI holds 33.4 million warrants for Cerebras shares, with some vesting tied to compute delivery dates and Cerebras' market cap exceeding $40 billion The M&A backdrop: - Arm Holdings $ARM and majority owner SoftBank made an approach to acquire Cerebras weeks before the expected IPO