China has told SoftBank it will not allow the Japanese investor’s $5.4 billion purchase of ABB’s robotics division to go ahead, dealing a setback to chief executive Masayoshi Son’s push into artificial intelligence, the Financial Times reported on Thursday.
Citing multiple people familiar with the matter, the newspaper said China’s state planner, the National Development and Reform Commission, would block the deal. SoftBank had expected the acquisition to be approved until last week, the report said.
The concern, according to the Financial Times, is data. The regulator is said to worry that operational data generated by robots in China could be transferred overseas and used to train AI models, including those developed by OpenAI, in which SoftBank is a major investor. China is ABB’s largest robotics market, accounting for about 30 per cent of the division’s business, and the unit employs more than 7,000 people, with around 500,000 robots installed worldwide for customers including BMW.
SoftBank agreed in October 2025 to buy the Swiss engineering group’s robotics business for an enterprise value of about $5.375 billion, with completion planned for mid-to-late 2026. The European Commission cleared the transaction without conditions in March, while a review in the United States had not concluded.
Son has cast the deal as central to his ambition to make SoftBank a leading player in what he calls “physical AI” — machines that combine robotics with AI models. The robotics purchase sits alongside SoftBank’s large investments in OpenAI and its Stargate data-centre venture.
SoftBank is now assessing what went wrong and whether it can seek approval again, the Financial Times said. ABB later said Chinese regulators had told SoftBank the acquisition of its robotics business in China was prohibited for now, while discussions continue, and that conditions keeping some intellectual property in China — possibly including a sale of certain assets to Chinese owners — were being weighed.
SoftBank shares fell about 5 per cent in Tokyo on Thursday.
A note on verification: Reuters said it could not immediately verify the Financial Times report. SoftBank declined to comment, ABB did not respond to Reuters’ requests for comment, and the National Development and Reform Commission could not be reached. The account of ABB’s later statement comes from a separate report, not from the companies themselves.
Sources: Reuters, “China blocks SoftBank’s $5.4 billion takeover of ABB’s robotics division, FT reports”, 5 November 2026 (https://mymixfm.com/2026/11/04/china-blocks-softbanks-5-4-billion-takeover-of-abbs-robotics-division-ft-reports/); Finimize, “China Put SoftBank’s ABB Robotics Deal On Ice”, 5 November 2026 (https://finimize.com/content/china-put-softbanks-abb-robotics-deal-on-ice).
