Welcome back to another episode of SparX by Mukesh Bansal. Today our host Mukesh, founder of Myntra and Cure.fit is in conversation with Alok Sama, the former President and CFO of SoftBank Group International. In this episode, we dive into the concept of the "money trap" and how one can avoid its pitfalls. Alok discusses his latest book, "The Money Trap", and explores topics such as his inspiration behind the book, Masayoshi Son's investment strategies, SoftBank's investment pitfalls, and more.

Resource list - 

The Money Trap by Alok Sama - https://amzn.in/d/g4Kpx8G 

Read more about Masayoshi Son - 

https://www.forbes.com/profile/masayoshi-son/ 

https://group.softbank/en/about/officer/son 

SoftBank Vision Fund - https://visionfund.com/in

Al Gore won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize - https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2007/gore/facts/

Trump’s Gold Card - https://thedispatch.com/article/trump-gold-card-visa-immigration-explained/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-gold-card-eb5-visa-5-million-immigration-oligarch-cbs-news-explains/ 

DeepSeek AI - 

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5yv5976z9po

https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/american-ai-firms-try-poke-holes-disruptive-deepseek-2025-01-28/ 

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/magazines/panache/is-deepseeks-rise-a-threat-to-american-ai-dominance-here-is-all-you-need-to-know/articleshow/117610064.cms?from=mdr

Travis Kalanick’s Resignation - 

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-40352868

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/21/technology/uber-ceo-travis-kalanick.html?smid=url-share 

WeWork’s Downfall - https://accountancycloud.com/blogs/weworks-2-billion-disaster-what-went-wrong#:~:text=Adam%20Neumann%2C%20WeWork's%20founder%20and,fund%20his%20own%20personal%20projects. 

https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/9/23/20879656/wework-mess-explained-ipo-softbank

Sarvam AI - https://www.sarvam.ai/