SoftBank's Son Lays Out Future of Smart Robots, Emotional Cars

TOKYO—Fresh from a $32 billion acquisition, SoftBank Group Corp.'s Masayoshi Son is already roaming in new directions, saying the company will focus on artificial intelligence and work with Honda Motor Co. to build cars that understand love.

Speaking at a company event Thursday, Mr. Son, SoftBank's chief executive, laid out a future of artificial intelligence, smart robots and the "Internet of Things." These would be in addition to SoftBank's existing core business of selling mobile-phone service in Japan and the U.S., where it controls Sprint Corp.

SoftBank's acquisition of U.K.-based chip designer ARM Holdings PLC, announced Monday, is a bet on demand for internet connectivity in everyday devices such as refrigerators and lightbulbs that store information about energy consumption. Mr. Son spent much of his speech Thursday touting the deal.

"Within 20 years, ARM is going to scatter one trillion chips around the globe, gathering all the real-time data instantly," he said. ARM designs were used in about 15 billion chips last year, he said.

He depicted the acquisition as part of a broader strategy to build artificial-intelligence functions into the kinds of devices that carry ARM-designed chips. For example, SoftBank and Honda said they will develop an artificial-intelligence system that will learn to perceive drivers' emotions from conversing with them as well as from sensors and cameras. The cars would develop their own emotions and seek to build a stronger attachment between humans and machines, the companies said.

They didn't say when vehicles with the technology would be available. Honda said it plans to open a development center in Tokyo around September. The project will make use of an "emotion engine" developed by a SoftBank subsidiary.

Mr. Son said that "Honda cars will be able to understand the feeling of love," which he called the most difficult emotion for AI to learn.

Mr. Son's vision in these areas has already been in motion for several years. In 2014, he introduced a humanlike robot named Pepper that he said could sense human feelings. Pepper was developed by France-based Aldebaran Robotics, which SoftBank acquired in 2012 for about $100 million. Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group, which manufactures Apple Inc.'s iPhone and iPad, is a partner in the production.

Combining software and chips would give SoftBank technology to help analyze diseases and natural disasters, Mr. Son said. "This super intelligence will be able to understand and predict the universe smartly and quickly," he said.

Write to Megumi Fujikawa at megumi.fujikawa@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 21, 2016 07:55 ET (11:55 GMT)

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