SoftBank Corp.
ソフトバンク株式会社

Type	Public
Traded as	TYO: 9984 OTC Pink: SFTBF
Industry	Telecommunications
Founded	September 3, 1981
Headquarters	Tokyo, Japan
Key people	Masayoshi Son (Chairman & CEO)
Products	Fixed line and mobile telephony, Internet services, digital television
Revenue	¥3.202 trillion (2012)[1]
Net income	¥313.75 billion (2012)[1]
Employees	21,799 (2011)[1]
Subsidiaries	SoftBank Mobile SOFTBANK TELECOM Yahoo! Japan (~40%) SoftBank BB
Website	SoftBank English Website

SoftBank Corp. (ソフトバンク株式会社, Sofutobanku Kabushiki-gaisha^?) is a Japanese telecommunications and Internet corporation, with operations in broadband, fixed-line telecommunications, e-Commerce, Internet, broadmedia, technology services, finance, media and marketing, and other businesses.

SoftBank was established in Tokyo, Japan on September 3, 1981, and had a market capitalization of approximately US$43.52 billion at March 2011.

SoftBank's corporate profile includes various other companies such as Japanese broadband company Cable & Wireless IDC, cable company BB-Serve, and gaming company GungHo Online Entertainment. Additionally, it has various partnerships in Japanese subsidiaries of foreign companies such as Yahoo!, E-Trade, Ustream.tv, EF Education First and Morningstar. SBI Group is a Japanese financial services company that began in 1999 as a branch of SoftBank.^[2]

SoftBank was the only official carrier of the iPhone in Japan until the release of iPhone 4S when it became available on au by KDDI as well.^[3]

A Softbank marketing campaign, beginning in June 2007, featuring a dog name "Otosan" who acts as patriarch for a human family known as the "Shiratos", has been one of Japan's most successful ad campaigns during that time.^[4]

Timeline[link]

• 1995 - Bought COMDEX from The Interface Group
• 1999 - Allowed organizers of COMDEX to restrict admission of media, creating a spiraling effect
• 2001 - Sold COMDEX to Key3Media, a spin-off of Ziff Davis
• January 28, 2005 - SoftBank becomes the owner of the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks, a Nippon Professional Baseball team.
• March 17, 2006 - SoftBank announces its agreement to buy Vodafone Japan, giving it a stake in Japan's $78 billion mobile market.
• Early April, 2006 - SoftBank completed the purchase of 23% of Betfair, an Internet betting exchange.
• October 1, 2006 - Vodafone Japan changes its corporate name, mobile phone brand name, and its mobile phone domain name to SoftBank Mobile, SoftBank, and [mb.softbank.jp] respectively.^[5]
• January 28, 2008 - It was announced that SoftBank and Tiffany & Co. collaborated in making a limited 10 model-only cellphone. This cellphone contains more than 400 platinum diamond, totalling more than 20 carat. The cost is said to be more than 100,000,000 yen.^[6]
• June 4, 2008 - SoftBank Mobile announced partnership with Apple and brought the iPhone (3G) to Japan later in 2008 ^[7]
• February 3, 2010 - SoftBank acquired 13.7% in Ustream with the option to increase shares to 30% by July 2011.^[8]
• October 1, 2010 - Ayumi Hamasaki becomes the commercial spokesperson.^[9]

Notes[link]

References[link]

• SoftBank Annual Report 2008

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: SoftBank

• SoftBank Corporation
• Masayoshi Son AXA Talents (www.axa-im-talents.com) (August 1, 2006)

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