Achieving Medium-term Management Plan While Balancing Growth Investments: SoftBank Corp. Integrated Report 2024 CFO Message

The English edition of SoftBank Corp.'s (TOKYO: 9434) Integrated Report for 2024, published on October 31, 2024, is a comprehensive report that not only covers SoftBank's financial information for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2024 (FY2023), but also outlines SoftBank's medium- to long-term growth strategies, ESG strategy, and more. In addition to providing a snapshot of the company's current status, the report communicates SoftBank's future goals and aspirations.

A message from Kazuhiko Fujihara, SoftBank's Board Director, Executive Vice President & CFO, is featured in the report. Below is an excerpt.

Review of FY2023 and outlook going forward

In FY2023, consolidated revenue reached a record high of ¥6,084.0 billion. Although consolidated operating income decreased due to the absence of the PayPay remeasurement gain of ¥294.8 billion, in terms of actual figures excluding this impact, we achieved double-digit growth of ¥110.7 billion (+15%) year on year. In addition to the core Consumer segment returning to profit growth, all segments reported higher profit. I believe we were able to achieve this growth because we pulled together as a team. In particular, I believe the market responded positively to the fact that we were able to turn around and get mobile service revenue back on a growth trajectory one year ahead of plan. We made a strong start in the first year of our Medium-term Management Plan, but we have not changed our final-year targets. This is because the business environment surrounding the Company is full of new growth opportunities, such as in the field of generative AI, and we want to lay the groundwork for the future. For the last three years, we had been curbing upfront investments partly due to the impact of mobile service price reductions and movement restrictions associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. We have finally emerged from this period of perseverance, and would like to use the anticipated profit growth as upfront investments to achieve substantial growth during the next Medium-term Management Plan period and beyond. Of course, we will firmly secure our current Medium-term Management Plan targets and balance them with growth investments.

The targets of our current Medium-term Management Plan, based on actual figures excluding the impact of the PayPay remeasurement gain, are a compound annual growth rate of 8% in operating income and 17% in net income from FY2022 (actual) to FY2025. These growth rates are by no means low, but our FY2023 results surpassed these target figures. I believe that our efforts have enabled us to further expand our options for future growth.

In addition to reviewing FY2023 and discussing SoftBank's future outlook, over the space of five pages, Fujihara talks about cost management, financial strategy, the Company's equity story, and delivers a message to the equity market.

His entire message can be found here, starting on page 26.

(Posted on November 15, 2024, Original Article Published on October 2, 2024)
by SoftBank News Editors

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