Sharp

"However, at Casio, Son was treated coldly by the section manager and was thoroughly disparaged, which left him feeling dejected. At Sharp, he was subjected to rather pointed questions by the person in charge. Although the feeling from his first choice, Sharp, was not bad, there wasn’t an optimistic sense that they would immediately sign a contract. There, Masayoshi Son devised a plan and called from near Osaka’s Umeda Station to the Osaka Patent Attorneys Association to investigate a patent office strong in dealing with Sharp. Fortunately, he was introduced to Patent Attorney Nishida of Nishida Patent Office, who was formerly with Sharp’s patent department. He immediately visited the office to confirm whether Son’s invention was worthy of a patent. Subsequently, he was informed about two key figures at Sharp: Executive Director Shosuke Sasaki, who was then the director of Sharp’s Central Research Laboratory (later VP of Sharp, advisor at SoftBank), and Deputy Head of Technology Atsushi Asada (later VP of Sharp and chairman of Nintendo). Son immediately asked for help. “Please call those two and tell them they should meet me.” The director called and said: “It sounds like an interesting device. At least try meeting him.” The next day, Masayoshi Son called Sharp to arrange a meeting, and together with his father, who was urgently summoned from Kyushu, he visited Sharp’s Central Research Laboratory in Tenri City, Nara Prefecture. At the time, still a 21-year-old student, Masayoshi Son thought he needed his father’s presence lest he not be taken seriously when it came to signing the contract. His father gladly accompanied him on his son’s first business venture. However, all negotiations were conducted by Masayoshi Son. The successful experience of negotiations at this time gave Masayoshi Son a significant confidence boost in launching and conducting business in earnest. In that sense, it became “Practice Session Number One” in negotiation combat for business selling."

"At that time, Gokitani had almost no knowledge about PCs or software. However, the explanation of the business content given by Masayoshi Son was very coherent and understandable. Gradually, he began to take interest and intuitively felt, “This could work.” They talked for about an hour. A loan of about 20 million yen was possible at the branch manager’s discretion. However, for 100 million yen, it had to pass through the head office’s screening department. After Masayoshi Son left, Branch Manager Gokitani called Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank’s Osaka and Namba branches. It was to approach Joshin Denki and Sharp. Gokitani had previously worked at the Osaka branch. President Norihiro Sumikawa of Joshin Denki responded to the Namba branch manager: “I intend to do business positively.” Also, Vice President Masaharu Sasaki of Sharp directly called the loan deputy manager of the Osaka branch and conveyed: “I know Mr. Son well. He is reliable. If Dai-Ichi Kangyo can take care of him, I would be most grateful.” The headquarters’ corporate department, which examines small loan projects, promptly discussed it, including Branch Manager Gokitani. The screening results were a total of minus fifteen points. However, Gokitani added fifteen points in the “Future Prospects” item, resulting in a final score of zero, and the loan was eventually approved. Just a week later, Dai-Ichi Kangyo lent 100 million yen to SoftBank Japan at the prime rate at that time."

"The method Masayoshi Son came up with was an “invention” as a means of creating capital, rather than just earning pocket change. The idea was to invent, sell the patents of new products, and start business with the royalties. The fruit of that effort was the invention of the “voice-equipped multilingual translator” (mentioned later), which he sold to Sharp for about 100 million yen."

"The one that was narrowed down became the prototype of an electronic organizer commercialized by Sharp. Masayoshi Son holds the patent for this product. The prototype invented by Masayoshi Son was a “multi-language translator with a speech device.” When Japanese is input via a keyboard, its translation is output as speech. It was an idea combining a dictionary, a computer’s speech synthesizer, and a calculator."

"Facit's fundamental problem was that the development people and technicians worked in a closed world, stuck in their own proud history. Meanwhile, out there in the "world," an electronic revolution was underway, of which I now have an example in my office: the Japanese Sharp electronic calculator, no bigger than a large matchbox and the first to be sold in Sweden. It was Facit that imported it in a desperate attempt to latch onto the new trend. It was a shocking realization in my young life that a Swedish, world-leading corporation could be so quickly swept off the board by new technology. It left deep marks."