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Press Releases 2006

Establishment of joint venture with Vodafone Group

May 18, 2006

SOFTBANK CORP. and Vodafone Group PLC, (head office: Newbury, UK; representative: Arun Sarin, hereinafter “Vodafone Group”) have agreed today to have a strategic partnership including establishment of a joint venture.

The partnership between Vodafone Group, a mobile telecom operator with one of the world largest in terms of customer base, and the SOFTBANK Group with world forefront Internet technology and know-how such as IP network technology will enable great synergies to be generated in various ways such as development and procurement of mobile handsets, content services and so forth.

1. Strategic partnership with Vodafone Group and purposes of establishment of joint venture

(1) Joint development and procurement of mobile handsets

Joint development and procurement together with Vodafone Group, one of the world largest mobile telecom operators, will enable more advantageous procurement of forefront mobile handsets.

(2) Joint development of new service platform and base software

Joint development of new service platform will enable distribution of broadband global content and provision of totally new mobile portal.

(3) Joint procurement and distribution of content

Procurement of content across the world leveraging the global network of Vodafone Group will realize distribution of overwhelming variety of content to users of both Groups.

Development through the joint venture is planned to be proceeded mainly in Japan. Various future successes through the joint venture will also be a base for further cooperation in areas such as IP network technology where the SOFTBANK Group already has experience.

2. Outline of joint venture

Capital 11billion JPY at maximum
  • SOFTBANK Group 50%
  • Vodafone Group 50%
Directors 4 directors planned to be delegated from the both companies.

3. Impact on consolidated financial results

The impact on the consolidated financial results of the fiscal year ending March 2007 is yet to be confirmed and will be announced as soon as it is finalized.

  • *Releases, announcements, presentations and other information available from this page and elsewhere on this website were prepared based on information available and views held at the time of preparation and speak only as of the respective dates on which they are filed or used by SOFTBANK or the applicable group company, as the case may be. Such information is subject to change and may become out-of-date. Such information may also contain forward-looking statements which are by their nature subject to various risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results and future developments to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Please read legal notices in its entirety prior to viewing any information available on this website.