SoftBank Group is pursuing an investment in Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Japan’s largest utility, as the AI-obsessed conglomerate tries to solve what may be the single biggest bottleneck in its grand plans: electricity.
TEPCO is reportedly in discussions with SoftBank and at least four other groups, including private equity giant KKR, about potential capital tie-ups. The utility is looking for strategic partners to help restructure its business as demand for power, driven largely by the explosive growth of AI data centers, continues to surge across Japan and globally.
Why SoftBank needs a power company
SoftBank has been on an AI spending spree that makes its previous Vision Fund era look restrained. The company has poured over $30B into OpenAI alone, acquiring roughly an 11% stake. It’s also the majority owner of Arm Holdings, the chip design firm whose architecture underpins most of the world’s smartphones and an increasing number of AI processors.
The company is planning large-scale data center campuses across Japan, including sites in Sakai (near Osaka) and Hokkaido, that will require multi-gigawatt power capacity. For context, a single gigawatt can power roughly 750,000 homes.
