India-born Misra named on board of SoftBank

MUMBAI: India-born Rajeev

Misra

has been inducted as a board member to the

SoftBank

Group (SBG) on the back of the Japanese conglomerate officially launching its

SoftBank Vision Fund

last weekend. Misra currently holds the position of the chief executive officer of the group’s gargantuan-sized fund, which was first announced last year.

An IIT alumnus, Misra was hired into SoftBank three years ago as head of strategic finance at the group around the time

Masayoshi Son

got on board

Nikesh Arora

, another India-born top-ranking executive. Arora was anointed as the heir apparent to Son and was also on the board of SBG before he quit. The election of Misra and a bunch of other new board members is subject to approval during SoftBank’s annual general meeting to be held on June 21. The telecom and technology conglomerate had said it made the first closing of $93 billion for its ambitious Vision Fund on May 20 in Riyadh along with the Saudi Arabian government, which has pitched in $45 billion as the fund’s largest sponsor. SBG’s wholly owned subsidiaries, collectively called as SoftBank Investment Advisers, will advise the SoftBank Vision Fund — by far the biggest such investing vehicle globally. SoftBank also appointed Marcelo Claure, president & CEO, Sprint, Simon Segars, CEO, ARM Holdings,

Mark Schwartz

, senior director, Goldman Sachs, and Yasir O Al-Rumayyan, MD of the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, on to the board. Schwartz and Al-Rumayyan intend to be external directors, SoftBank said in a prepared statement on Friday.