Last week Softbank Vision Fund 2 cooperated with a huge round price $ 120 million to a cyber security start-up in the field of drama Cyberason. The contract was the latest round Softbankfamous Vision Fund The unit-but during the stunning height of the project boom around 2021 usually invests in over 50 offers of one quarter, but at the end of 2023 it silenced deadly.
However, evidently Vision Fund 2 returns strongly. In the last almost two quarters, the fund has participated in 13 funds – many of them large and many of them covering artificial intelligence – at Crunch data.
A dozen or so bacer offers, including financing large rounds for equivalent to such I need to calculate Helion Energy AND EmbarrassmentThis is greater than the fund participated in the previous 4 fourth in total. Within 12 months, the fund took part in only 10 contracts to the quarter of 2024.
Return on the track?
Of course, only three years ago 13 offers inside five months at Vision Fund-once known from clever investments in startups, including Uber AND Doordash – There can be almost no news. In the quarter of 2021, the vision fund participated in 66 rounds.
But it was a completely different time to invest the undertaking. The rates of interest were low, the money was essentially free, and the Venture Capital couldn’t keep the check books in their pockets for greater than five minutes.
When the market returned to reality in 2022, the founding father of Softbank Son of Masayoshi He said he would withdraw investments because the vision fund suffered heavy losses.
It seemed that the respite didn’t last long. By mid -2012, Son told investors that he would again pass from the “defense mode” because the company wanted to grow to be a leader in artificial intelligence and robotics.
However, when Son made an investment directly with Softbank, the Vision Fund was silent. In the two -year period between the quarter 2022 and Q3 2024, the fund took part in only 33 contracts.
It was not so surprising, considering that the fund was still receiving brands. In fact, last month Softbank he reported a net loss of just about $ 2.4 billion for its third fiscal quarter, including a lack of about $ 2 billion for its one -time vision fund as a share Coupang AND Didi cut.
Regardless, at the end of last yr, the fund began to come back to life. In the last quarter of 2024, the fund made six investments, including participation in the AI drive startup Embarrassment‘S High-profiles price $ 500 million D series in December.
It was not only an AI agreement. The Vision Fund also took part in Data Center GDS InternationalAn enormous B. series with a value of $ 1.2 billion
However, while AI played a role in the return of the fund, she didn’t ignore other sectors. The fund took part in the New York Clinical Stage Biofarmaceutical Startup CitiesSeries B 215 million dollars Venrock Healthcare Capital Partners AND Wellington Managementand also in India Successful executive educationThe $ 150 million series F. Startup provides educational programs for the management.
The fund also made a strategic investment of an undisclosed amount in the cloud safety startup Wizard in November.
New yr
Softbank continued this investment term by 2025. At the starting of March, the Vision Fund made seven investments. Like Q4, the fund took part in some large rounds.
In January, he participated in the C series price $ 100 million for Seattle Union BiopharmaDeveloper of in vivo mobile therapy, in addition to $ 200 million of the E series for Spain, Business Travel Management Platform Travelperk.
The fund also ran- LightSpeed Partners AND Altman itself – a series F with a value of $ 425 million at Fusion startup Helion Energy. This round valued an energy startup at $ 5.4 billion, because investors want to pour money into recent energy sources as the needs of power increases due to artificial intelligence and other progress.
Last month, the fund took part in the Ireland platform for automation of labor flow without code In order to“Series C with a value of $ 125 million, but directed by Boston Boston Neutal-Atom Quantum companies I want to calculateOffer of notes worth $ 230 million along with Google Quantum AI.
What does it mean
Despite these offers, the fund will probably never return to the investment level in 2021.
It is price noting, nevertheless, that even some of the large crossover funds, equivalent to Tiger Global Management AND Dragoneer This helped to keep a fee in Venture in 2021, it should not return to the industry yet, the vision fund seems more interesting.
It is also interesting that while Softbank itself seems to be a laser focused on all AI things – Openai and proposed $ 500 billion AI Stargate project,
Of course, in the case of the latest fund record, perhaps the wisest can be to stop money in your pockets. However, in the case of startups, it could be exciting to see the repetition of a larger investor.