Aug 30, 2021 · 39m · 20vc
20VC: Marcelo Claure, CEO of Softbank Group International on Lessons From Investing $1BN Per Week with Masa Son, How Softbank Could Have Up To 8 Companies Go Public in LATAM Alone Next Year & How Softbank Analyse Both Deal Pricing and Competition Today
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of 20VC, Harry Stebbings interviews Marcelo Claure, CEO of SoftBank Group International, discussing his trajectory as an entrepreneur and CEO, SoftBank's high-velocity global investment strategy alongside Masa Son, and how their $5 billion fund transformed the Latin American tech ecosystem.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Harry holds 30.6% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Harry as informed peer 4.7 Guest teaching 4.2 Guest disagreement 2.1 Harry pushing back 3.0
speaking balance: gold is Harry, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 21:22 VC Industry Disruption Rebuttal
Marcelo forcefully argues that incumbent venture capital firms badmouthed SoftBank to founders simply because SoftBank's $100B fund disrupted their comfortable, traditional business models.
Hardest push from Harry ▶ 21:14 Pressing on Regional SoftBank ReceptionHarry interrupts Marcelo's generalized answer on long-term capital to sharply restate his prompt about why SoftBank faced public backlash in the US while being warmly received in LATAM.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 22:37 Valuation Discipline vs TAM FrameworkMarcelo reframes Harry's question on price discipline by explaining that in massive TAM markets like Nubank or Kavak, entry price is almost irrelevant compared to execution.
Harry holds his own ▶ 34:27 Challenging the Opportunity Fund ScaleHarry uses overall SoftBank deployment statistics to directly confront Marcelo with critics' views that the $100M Opportunity Fund represents a negligible 0.1% commitment.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Harry as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Harry pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Marcelo Claure's Journey from Entrepreneur to SoftBank CEO | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | Harry asks pleasant introductory questions about Marcelo's career transition from founder to SoftBank executive. Marcelo outlines his background and the turnarounds at Brightstar and Sprint, providing context Harry actively listens to. | |
| Learning Venture Investing Alongside Masa Son in Tokyo | 3 | 4 | 1 | 1 | Harry asks setup questions regarding working alongside Masa Son in Tokyo. Marcelo educates the host on Masa's founder-first mentality and the daily operational pace of writing checks ranging from $50 million to $8 billion. | |
| SoftBank's Capital Deployment Strategy | 5 | 4 | 2 | 3 | Harry references traditional venture fund deployment schedules and asks how SoftBank views deployment targets. Marcelo reframes the premise, explaining that using proprietary balance sheet capital frees SoftBank from standard LP fund cycle rules. | |
| Launching the SoftBank Latin America Fund | 5 | 5 | 3 | 4 | Harry presents a common market critique that LATAM tech consists primarily of copycat business models. Marcelo counters directly, reframing them as 'tropicalized' adaptations tailored to local market failures like unbanked populations. | |
| Portfolio Strategy, Synergies, and Managing Competitor Conflicts | 4 | 4 | 1 | 2 | Harry asks about managing portfolio construction and competitive overlaps. Marcelo explains real-world examples of portfolio conflict in LATAM and how SoftBank utilizes information barriers. | |
| Patient Capital and Disrupting the Venture Industry | 5 | 6 | 4 | 5 | Harry pushes Marcelo on why SoftBank is celebrated in LATAM but faced hostility in the US. Marcelo responds forcefully, arguing legacy VCs trashed SoftBank because its massive capital deployments disrupted their traditional business models. | |
| Valuation Discipline, Exits, and LATAM Market Potential | 6 | 5 | 2 | 4 | Harry questions check sizes relative to valuation discipline and asks about exit venues. Marcelo breaks down his valuation methodology, using his early miss on Nubank to illustrate where market size renders entry price secondary. | |
| The Rise of Competition and Tiger Global's Impact | 6 | 3 | 2 | 3 | Harry references market commentary regarding Tiger Global's aggressive pacing and asks how SoftBank adapts. Marcelo acknowledges Tiger's strategy as a replication of SoftBank's model and welcomes the competition. | |
| Executive Execution, Hiring Criteria, and Coaching Leaders | 4 | 3 | 1 | 2 | Harry brings up specific quotes from board member Bruce Dunleavy to ask how Marcelo manages his massive workload. Marcelo explains his delegation philosophy and leadership recruitment criteria. | |
| Leadership Philosophy and Perspective on Wealth | 6 | 5 | 4 | 5 | Harry pushes on critics who call SoftBank's $100M Opportunity Fund a tiny fraction (0.1%) of total deployment. Marcelo passionately rejects the framing, drawing on his personal experience as a Latino founder facing bias to defend the fund's dedicated focus. |
Statements from this episode (25)
SoftBank Latin America Fund Commands $5 Billion in Dedicated Capital
“Marcello also spearheads the SoftBank Latin America Fund, a five billion dollar fund dedicated to investing in technology growth opportunities throughout the region.”
Masa Son acquired Brightstar on condition Claure became Sprint CEO
“He offered to buy Brightstar with only one condition, and that condition was that I would become the CEO of Sprint.”
Claure: Sprint Was Losing $5B Annually When He Took Over as CEO
“Sprint was losing five billion dollars a year.”
Claure: Sprint Cut $11B in Costs Under His Leadership
“We basically reduced eleven billion dollars of cost, and we figured that we could do a lot more with a lot less people, a lot less just bureaucracy.”
Claure: SoftBank wrote $50M and $8B checks on the same day
“There was a meeting in which we wrote a fifty million dollar check, and there was a meeting that we wrote an eight billion dollar check. And that could happen the same day.”
Claure: SoftBank operates 26 global teams meeting hundreds of founders weekly
“Today we have 26 investment teams all over the world that are meeting hundreds of entrepreneurs every single week”
Claure: SoftBank invests exclusively its own capital with no LPs
“We only invest our own capital. We don't have our own LPs. We don't have specific cycles.”
Claure: SoftBank deploys $40B to $50B annually
“We're investing 40 to fifty billion dollars a year.”
Claure: SoftBank produced 22 Latin American unicorns in one year
“We have produced, I think, a total of 22 unicorns last year, where before that, there were like one, so it's been amazing what I'm seeing in Latin America.”
Claure: SoftBank tests founder execution, not business models, in LATAM
“And to be fair, we have a competitive advantage. And that's the fact that we have seen these business models being deployed in China and India and the US. So when companies shop in Latin America with a similar business model, we don't need to test whether the …”
Claure: Half of the population in Latin America is unbanked
“I mean, half the population is unbanked, right?”
Claure: SoftBank invested in Univision and backed its Televisa acquisition
“We just invested in, in a media company in the U.S. Called Univision, which is, has a 70% market share for Hispanics, And then we helped them buy Televisa in Mexico.”
Claure: SoftBank uses Univision TV ads to accelerate fintech portfolio growth
“We're using that company to put ads in traditional TV to help people to download the app of our fintech companies and making our fintech companies explode.”
Claure: SoftBank constructs Chinese walls when portfolio companies become direct competitors
“What we do at that point in time is we basically split the responsibilities within investment partners. We build these Chinese walls to make sure nobody except me can see what they're doing, and we're very careful in information sharing.”
Claure: SoftBank disrupted venture capital just like Uber disrupted taxi drivers
“The same way Uber disrupted the taxi drivers, we disrupted the venture capital industry. While people used to write these small checks, we suddenly showed up with a hundred billion dollars, and we disrupted the way venture capital works today, and therefore, w…”
Claure: VCs should provide full capital upfront to avoid continuous fundraising
“We're believers in you have to provide an entrepreneur the right amount of capital on day one. Entrepreneurs should not be focused half their time trying to raise money and half the time trying to run a business. So why not provide the right amount of capital …”
Claure: SoftBank Passed on Nubank Early On Due to High Price
“I passed on Nubank because of the price at the beginning when we started the fund, and it was the wrong decision because the opportunity was huge.”
Claure: SoftBank Generated a 10x Return on VTEX IPO
“Two weeks back, we just took Vitex public at a very high valuation. I think it's whatever, 10 X what we invested.”
Claure: SoftBank Will Take 8 LATAM Fund Companies Public by 2022
“My expectation is that we take at least eight of our companies public between this year and next year of the Latin American fund.”
Claure: SoftBank backs over 84% of Latin American unicorns
“I was looking at the market share of unicorns that we have in Latin America. It's over 84% of companies”
Claure: Tiger Global replicated SoftBank's model, forcing faster dealmaking
“Tiger basically has replicated the SoftBank model, and there's nothing magical about what they're doing, and it's great, because what Tiger does, it forces my teams to make quicker decisions now.”
Claure offered Sandeep Mathrani the WeWork CEO job 30 minutes into a board interview
“And in one of my board interviews, I met Sandeep. I was interviewing for a board member. And I tell you, 30 minutes into the interview, I said, let me stop. I said, you should not be a board member. You should be the CEO of WeWork.”
Claure regrets SoftBank missing major MercadoLibre investment in 2018
“So MercadoLibre, in July, 2018, the value was significantly less, and I didn't push mass enough for us to make an enormous play with MercadoLibre, because I didn't truly understand investing back then.”