FOMO should not dictate investment decisions

Alok Sama, advisor to private equity major Warburg Pincus, has rich experience in the investment banking space.

- Alok Sama, advisor to private equity major Warburg Pincus,

He worked as the president and CFO of Softbank Group, founded hedge fund Baer Capital and is currently working on his second book. He tells Nesil Stanley that he worries about companies with no product, plan or revenues getting valuations of $5-$10 billion. Excerpts:

Which were the most challenging deals during your tenure at SoftBank?

The most challenging situation by far was Sprint, which was struggling when I joined SoftBank in 2014 and could have resulted in tens of billions in losses. The multi-year project of engineering the merger with T-Mobile — as described in the book — led to tens of billions in profits instead. It was very challenging, and in the end, very satisfying.

There has only ever been one person at the helm of SoftBank, and that is Masayoshi Son. I have learned a lot from him. He is a genius and, besides, fun to hang out with.

How did you beat competitors during deal banking?