SoftBank Group, Grab and Petroleum Sarawak Berhad (PETROS) have signed a joint development agreement covering plans for US$1 billion of initial combined seed capital for AI infrastructure in Sarawak. SoftBank’s 9 November press release matches the text Grab filed the same day as Exhibit 99.1 to Form 6-K (Commission File 001-41110).
The proposed split is US$800 million from SoftBank Group, US$100 million from Grab and US$100 million from PETROS—about RM4.07 billion in total. SoftBank would lead and majority-own the Sarawak AI infrastructure project, with Grab and PETROS as strategic partners, toward a long-term target of five gigawatts of AI compute capacity. Deployment is staged and subject to projects hitting development and customer-contract milestones, plus necessary closing conditions. Definitive investment and governance agreements are still pending.
What the JDA does—and does not—lock in
The parties say the JDA builds on an 8 October Framework Agreement signed in Kuching and moves the partnership into a joint-development phase. SoftBank Group would bring global AI and technology capabilities, Grab its digital and AI experience across Southeast Asia, and PETROS local energy and infrastructure development through the Sarawak Gas Roadmap and its role as master developer of the Kuching Low-Carbon Hub. The companies also say they will seek more investors and hyperscaler customers. The release ties the initiative to Malaysia’s AI Nation 2030 agenda and Sarawak’s Post COVID-19 Development Strategy 2030—policy banners, not construction permits.
Masayoshi Son, SoftBank’s chairman and CEO, said the group aims to “create lasting opportunities in Sarawak and support the development of technology-driven economic activity across Malaysia and the wider region.” Grab’s Dato’ Anthony Tan and PETROS’s Dato Janin Girie likewise frame the project around jobs and economic diversification beyond oil and gas. Those are leadership quotes from the joint release, not independent assessments of demand.
The same filing’s forward-looking section is explicit about residual risk: the companies may not enter into definitive agreements, may not agree investment and governance terms, and projects may not proceed on the contemplated terms—or at all. Land, power, connectivity, customer demand, permits and financing remain open. Readers should treat the US$1 billion and five-gigawatt figures as planned targets inside that caveat stack, not as funded, shovel-ready capacity.
The Kuching Low-Carbon Hub framing is doing a lot of work in the PETROS narrative: gas infrastructure, carbon capture, LNG-to-power and port assets are presented as the substrate that makes a multi-gigawatt AI campus imaginable. That may prove true, but it is still a development thesis. SoftBank’s majority ownership claim likewise sits inside the same forward-looking basket until definitive agreements fix voting rights, capital calls and offtake priority.
SoftBank’s regional AI bets keep moving
Sarawak sits in a wider SoftBank and Malaysia AI-infrastructure story. TSN has covered SoftBank’s separate China friction on the blocked ABB Robotics purchase, and Malaysia’s own compute pull through Google’s US$15bn Malaysia investment plans and Google’s Negeri Sembilan water deal. The SoftBank–Grab–PETROS JDA is another capital signal into East Malaysia’s power-and-land package, not a completed campus.
Seed capital is not a campus
A billion dollars of staged seed, majority SoftBank ownership and a five-gigawatt ambition make a clear headline. The filing’s own risk factors do the harder work: without definitive agreements, contracted customers and reliable power, the JDA is a development framework. That honesty is useful. It separates a signed work plan from energised racks.
What to watch next is whether a joint-venture entity and governance terms appear in a later 6-K or SoftBank disclosure, whether hyperscaler offtake is named, and how Sarawak’s gas-to-power and low-carbon hub timelines line up with the staged funding gates. Until those land, Sarawak AI remains a planned infrastructure partnership with public seed numbers—not an operating region on the cloud map.
Equity splits announced at seed stage often move once hyperscaler offtake and power PPAs are real; treat the SoftBank majority line as the intended structure, not a closed company register.
Sources
- SoftBank Group press release, 9 November 2026
- Grab Holdings Form 6-K Exhibit 99.1 (SEC), 9 November 2026
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