Masayoshi Son, the golden goose, and a pile of debt

MASAYOSHI Son wants to sell the goose. At least, some of it. As much as people love to talk about the founder of SoftBank Group being a masterful investor - and inevitably point to Alibaba Group Holding as evidence - the reality is that SoftBank is all about POTS.

It's not sexy, but SoftBank's Plain Old Telephone Service in Japan is what pays the bills. It accounts for just 36 per cent of revenue, behind 39 per cent from Sprint, yet delivers 67 per cent of the mothership's operating income.

Sprint is such dog of a company that it ranks third behind even Yahoo! Japan in terms of contribution to SoftBank's bottom line. So when the Nikkei newspaper reported over the weekend that Masa may list his domestic telco locally and overseas, it got me thinking: What's left? A hunk of debt, that's what.