SoftBank

SoftBank

SoftBank Corp. (ソフトバンク株式会社, Sofutobanku Kabushiki-gaisha?) is a Japanese telecommunications and Internet corporation, with operations in broadband, fixed-line telecommunications, e-Commerce, Internet, broadmedia, technology services, finance, media and marketing, and other businesses.

SoftBank was established in Tokyo, Japan on September 3, 1981, and had a market capitalization of approximately US$43.52 billion at March 2011.

SoftBank's corporate profile includes various other companies such as Japanese broadband company Softbank BB, data center company IDC Frontier, gaming company GungHo Online Entertainment, and the publishing company SoftBank Creative. Additionally, it has various partnerships in Japanese subsidiaries of foreign companies such as Yahoo!, E-Trade, Ustream.tv, EF Education First and Morningstar. SBI Group is a Japanese financial services company that began in 1999 as a branch of SoftBank.

SoftBank was the only official carrier of the iPhone in Japan until the release of iPhone 4S when it became available on au by KDDI as well.

On October 14, 2012, it announced that it will acquire 70% of the U.S. telecommunications company Sprint Nextel Corporation (Sprint) (NYSE: S), for $20.1 billion. The deal is expected to be completed by the second quarter of 2013.

A Softbank marketing campaign, beginning in June 2007, featuring a dog named "Otosan" who acts as patriarch for a human family known as the "Shiratos", has been one of Japan's most successful ad campaigns during that time.