Team size: 31
What are the most significant cases or transactions that you have been involved in over the past year?
Our team has been involved in numerous significant cases and transactions over the past 12 months. A sample of the ten most significant is as follows:
1) Arm Holdings IPO on NASDAQ. This was the largest IPO in the last several years and received substantial press coverage. Since listing, the stock price has more than doubled.
2) Unwinding of an US$8.5bn asset backed financing using SBG’s shareholding of Arm Holdings prior to IPO, and subsequent execution of a margin loan using Arm listed stock as collateral (all timed in unison with the Arm IPO listing).
3) Purchase of 25% of Arm Holdings from SB Vision Fund 1 shortly before the Arm IPO, for a purchase price of approximately US$16bn. While to the public this may appear as an “internal” transfer, Vision Fund 1 is a regulated fund with outside investors, and therefore a rigorous arm’s length negotiation occurred between the Manager of the Fund and SBG.
4) Negotiating the terms of the WeWork bankruptcy in SoftBank’s role as a major investor. WeWork emerged from bankruptcy in June 2024.
5) Making an approximately US$1bn investment in the UK autonomous vehicle company, Wayve.
6) Establishing an autonomous trucking company from scratch, including setting up all employment, corporate governance and compliance policies etc. Stack AV, Inc now employs a few hundred engineers and staff.
7) Establishing a robot manufacturing joint venture with Alat, a subsidiary of the Public Investment Fund in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
8) Multiple global financings more than US$1bn leveraging SBG’s assets as collateral. [Confidential]
9) Managing a claim in the UK made by Credit Suisse with regards to certain matters relating to Greensill Capital and Katerra (portfolio companies of Vision Fund 2).
10) Managing two material disputes in the US with regards to SBG’s monetisation of its investment in the US telecom, TMobile.

What innovations have you made to the way your legal team works in the past year?
In November 2023, we established an AI Innovation Working group within the three units that report to me (legal, compliance and government affairs). The group has accomplished numerous in the first 100 days, such as holding AI Knowledge Sessions for SoftBank Group employees on technology and regulatory landscape, establishing an AI resource library, establishing a Vendor AI risk assessment process, creating Vendor AI contract principles and provisions, conducting 14 interviews with law firms on AI tools, trends and risks, providing law firms with detailed instructions to integrate AI into work for SoftBank, and making responsible use of responsible Generative AI as an addition to group code of conduct.
Also, we have also established three separates internal GPTs that review term sheets, check commercial contracts against templates and issues lists, and review law firm usage.

Are the effects of AI on the legal world overplayed, or underplayed?
The effect that AI will have on the legal profession is still vastly underestimated in my view. Some law firms have however been proactive in seeking to understand and prepare for the changes as they occur. Sadly, I have not seen a great deal of uptake in the domestic market in Tokyo yet. That said, none of the changes are likely to occur “overnight”, as generative AI is still in its nascent early stages. Firms that will succeed are those that recognise that in-house counsel at their clients will not be comfortable playing time-based fees for much longer (particularly if the use of time is seen as inefficient by not utilising AI tools), and so there is a high likelihood that value-based fees will be increasingly utilised. Augmented lawyers will increasingly use these tools to provide advice quicker and in more depth, and hence a lawyer’s human values and judgments, and access to larger quantities of legally focussed data are likely to be what clients will be willing to pay higher amounts for.