Hiroshi Mikitani

Hiroshi Mikitani founded Rakuten in 1997 and built it into Japan's largest e-commerce platform and one of the country's most diversified internet companies. Rakuten's ecosystem includes e-commerce (Rakuten Ichiba marketplace), fintech (Rakuten Card, Rakuten Bank, Rakuten Securities, Rakuten Insurance), travel (Rakuten Travel), digital content, and the famously ambitious Rakuten Mobile venture. Mikitani's most consequential — and controversial — decision was launching Rakuten Mobile in 2020 as Japan's fourth mobile carrier, building the network entirely from scratch using cloud-native, virtualized Open RAN (Radio Access Network) technology. This approach replaces traditional proprietary telecom equipment from Nokia, Ericsson, and Huawei with software running on commodity hardware, potentially reducing network costs by 30-40%. While technologically revolutionary, the buildout consumed over $10 billion in investment, severely straining Rakuten's finances and requiring multiple capital raises. The mobile venture has been a polarizing bet: bulls argue that once the network reaches sufficient population coverage and subscriber scale, the economics will be transformative — both for Rakuten and for the telecom industry globally through Rakuten Symphony (which licenses the Open RAN platform to other operators). Bears counter that the cash burn is unsustainable and has destroyed shareholder value. Key stock drivers include mobile subscriber growth, ARPU trends, network coverage expansion, cash burn trajectory, fintech and e-commerce ecosystem performance, and whether Rakuten Symphony can generate meaningful third-party revenue.