We analyzed which other Alibaba or Ant Financial portfolio companies might be future targets of the $100B Softbank Vision Fund.
Softbank’s 2000 investment into a then-fledgling Alibaba is hailed as one of the most prescient bets in tech investing ever. Now Softbank is increasingly co-investing with its former portfolio company. With Softbank set to lead a new investment into Alibaba-backed mobile wallet firm Paytm in India, after having just pumped $5.5B into Didi Chuxing (also Alibaba-backed), we analyzed which other Alibaba or Ant Financial portfolio companies might be future targets of the $100B Softbank Vision Fund.
- Ofo – The bike-sharing platform, valued at $1B in March, recently added Ant Financial as an investor and is already a portfolio company of Softbank-backed Didi Chuxing.
- Magic Leap – Before it was acquired by Wanda Group, Softbank led a $250M into Thomas Tull’s Legendary Entertainment. Legendary and Tull personally are invested in the augmented reality company Magic Leap as is Alibaba.
- Ele.me – The $4.5B online food delivery service recently expressed ambitions to expand into markets including Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore — plans that Softbank’s long-term capital would help facilitate. Both Didi and Alibaba are investors.
- URWork – This is probably less likely after URWork’s merger with rival co-working firm New Space last week, though it’s not hard to imagine further co-working consolidation in the future as URWork goes head to head with Softbank-backed WeWork in China.
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