‘SOFTBANK STILL MULLING UBER MOVE’
Firm says final decision will depend on whether its conditions are met
JAPAN’S SoftBank Group Corp said yesterday it was considering investing in Uber Technologies Inc but there was no final agreement at this stage.
“If conditions on share price and a minimum of shares are not satisfactory for the SoftBank Group side, there is a possibility the SoftBank Group may not make an investment,” it said in a statement.
Uber said this week a planned deal with SoftBank and Dragoneer Investment Group was moving forward. The investment could be worth up to US$10 billion (RM4.19 billion), said sources.
SoftBank and Dragoneer are leading a consortium that plans to invest US$1 billion to US$1.25 billion in Uber, the mostly highly valued venture-backed company in the world, along with a purchase of up to 17 per cent of existing shares in a secondary transaction.
Progress in the negotiations came after venture capital firm Benchmark, an early investor with a board seat in the ride-services company, and former chief executive Travis Kalanick struck a peace deal, reaching agreement over terms of the planned SoftBank investment.
The Japanese tech and telecoms firm has become a prolific investor in ride-sharing firms, such as China’s Didi and India’s Ola, as it works to achieve SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son’s vision of a future driven by artificial intelligence and interconnected devices.
Meanwhile, Uber’s chief of policy for India and South Asia has quit, said two sources familiar with the matter on Monday, in the latest high-level departure at the company.
Shweta Rajpal Kohli, a former Indian journalist who joined Uber last year, would join cloud-based software maker Salesforce.com Inc next month, said the sources.
Uber confirmed Kohli had quit in a statement yesterday.
Uber counts India as its second-biggest market after the United States. Reuters