A complex devoted to artificial intelligence manufacturing and robotics may be on the verge of being built in southern Arizona.
The SoftBank Group Corporation, which is based in Tokyo, is reported to be interested in building what would be a $1 trillion industrial complex that would combine its efforts with the still-expanding Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company.
Exactly what sort of partnership – if it could even be called that – the two companies would share has not yet been revealed.
That SoftBank is a major player in the AI world is without dispute. Founded in 1981, the company has long focused on investment management, seeing revenue more than $6.7 trillion in 2023.
SoftBank has had investment relationships in such areas as biotechnology, logistics, and software. Earlier this year it was announced that it was launching an estimated $500 billion artificial intelligence infrastructure system in a project with the U.S. government.
That investment, called the Stargate Project, is expected to be spread out over a four-year period.
In comments just made during SoftBank’s annual shareholders’ meeting, chief executive officer Masayoshi Son remarked: “We want to be the organizer of the industry in the artificial super intelligence era.”
The SoftBank plan for Arizona is called Project Crystal Land and may, according to reports, be dependent upon incentives from both the federal government and Arizona.
June 27, 2025
By Garry Boulard
Photo courtesy of Unsplash
