Kenichiro Mogi explains "The unconventional thinking and actions of charismatic people"

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On April 3, 2011, Softbank announced that Masayoshi Son would personally donate 10 billion yen to the victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake. The motives behind Son's actions that shocked the whole country are revealed!

Immediately after the earthquake, SoftBank received a lot of complaints. Although there were almost no disruptions to the Internet, including Twitter, mobile phones continued to be difficult to use for email and phone calls. "I can't talk to the people I want to talk to to check on their safety," "I can't get a signal when it really matters," "What's the point of having a cell phone?"

"We received a lot of complaints from customers like that," says Masato Ikeda (head of marketing at SoftBank Mobile). In fiscal 2010, SoftBank led the way for 12 consecutive months in net increases in mobile phone remove background image contracts. The "signal problems" cast a shadow over the company's robust performance. The assigned signals were technically unfavorable, and the poor signal quality was becoming a "reputation," when the earthquake occurred and user dissatisfaction exploded. Immediately after the earthquake, it was difficult to connect to any mobile phone carrier, so many employees must have felt frustrated.

To clear its name, SoftBank has been working on many initiatives for the victims since the Great East Japan Earthquake. They include free mobile phone rentals, free e-mail (for a limited time), extended payment plans to eliminate financial anxiety, and a scheme to allow people to donate to NPOs directly from their mobile phones. Masayoshi Son also took the lead in supporting the affected areas, visiting the disaster-stricken areas of Fukushima and announcing various support measures. Given SoftBank's management philosophy of "Making people happy through the information revolution," I feel that these support measures are persuasive, but criticism has also been leveled online, with people saying things like "This is a publicity stunt (using the earthquake disaster)," "They're trying to cover up the lack of signal," and "They're giving away products for free, but they're planning to take money from them a few years later." In hindsight, this still wasn't enough.