Masayoshi Son

“The pension system ties you to companies much longer in Japan.”

“I am the largest shareholder in SoftBank; I share the same interest as the other shareholders.”

“I started Softbank in 1981, a year and a half after I came back from the United States, after graduating from Berkeley. I wanted to start my own company when I came back to Japan.”

“The best opportunity for return on investment is in the information revolution.”

“I am the man who keeps his words.”

“Internet as a service is like culture that you have to understand, and each country has a local culture.”

“I'm still committed to the success of the U.K. and the belief of the strong intelligence and passion and determination of the British people. I'm a strong believer of their long-term historical success.”

“Indian software engineers are the best in the world; even in Silicon Valley, the best software engineers are Indians.”

“I think Snapdeal could become the Alibaba of India.”

“In the early stages of Internet in Japan, many said that Japanese and Americans are different. There are 10 reasons why Japanese Internet is not taking off. I said none of them are right; it's just a time lag. And, of course, Japanese Internet took off.”

“My original intent for investing into Sprint - the main strategy was to buy Sprint and T-Mobile at the same time, so we'd have a critical mass to fight against AT&T and Verizon. The U.S. government didn't accept that. They rejected it. So my fundamental strategy was broken.”

“We only live once, so I want to think big.”

“We have lots of ideas, lots of dreams.”

“I am going to support Ola.”

“When Gates was active in business, he was the smartest - so focused that no company could surpass Microsoft.”

“When I was a kid, our family was not that rich.”

“Money is available from investors as long as you have a great business model and a talented leader.”

“Difficulty comes not only because of your mistakes, but once you try to make an excuse or accuse someone else, your mind stops thinking.”

“Traditional companies have to start looking into themselves to offer more opportunities in their companies by starting new subsidiaries and joint ventures.”

“I don't care whether the technology is invented by our employees. I want to bring everybody's innovations into our ecosystem together.”