Softbank marked up its Indian and Southeast Asian investment by $74 M

While announcing the company’s quarterly results, Softbank’s Chief Masayoshi Son, said that he would back unicorns that are market leaders.

Japan-based internet and telecom major, Softbank gained almost $74 million (8,069 million yen) primarily on account of gain in the investments done in companies in Southeast Asia and India in the nine-month period ending December 2017. Its major investments in the region and India are in Flipkart, Ola, Oyo, Grab, and others.

The gain from the investments in this region stand in contrast with the loss of $360 million (39,281 million yen) that it incurred during the corresponding period ending December 2016. For the last fiscal ending March, 2017, the loss on financial instruments at fair value through profit and loss (FVTPL) was 160,419 million yen ($1.4 billion).

While announcing the company’s quarterly results, Softbank’s Chief Masayoshi Son, said that he would back unicorns that are market leaders.

During the announcement, the company disclosed in a presentation that Indian cab aggregator Ola is clocking 1.5 million rides daily. It also mentioned that Uber, where SoftBank has picked up a 15 percent stake recently, is clocking 15 million rides daily, whereas Didi and Grab are clocking 25 million and 3.5 million rides per day.

Recently, SoftBank set up the $100 billion Vision Fund and Masayoshi has been aggressive in making a spate of investments across internet startups globally. Last year, the Japanese conglomerate committed about $4 billion to three Indian companies – Flipkart, Ola, and Paytm.

Softbank, which also owns stakes in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba and British computer chip and software giant Arm, said its October-December profit was 912.3 billion yes ($8.4 billion), up from 80.3 billion yen a year earlier.