Nikesh Arora, president of SoftBank, has said he will buy a breathtaking Y60 billion ($US483 million) worth of shares in the Japanese telecoms and internet group, in a sign of his commitment to the company as the handpicked successor to billionaire Masayoshi Son.

He added: “This is a large transaction for me, and involves taking an enormous risk in my life once again”.

Additionally, in June earlier this year, it, along with Bharti Enterprises and Taiwan’s Foxconn, pledged to invest about $20 billion in India’s solar sector, one of the biggest commitments made to date in the country’s renewable energy space.

Arora is well paid by Softbank, with total compensation in 2014 coming in at $135 million thanks to Softbank poaching him from Google, and having to make up lost stock options.

Jefferies’Atul Goyal, a long-time SoftBank fan and no stranger to this blog, applauded Arora’s gutsy move this morning.

In a regulatory filing to the Tokyo Stock Exchange on Wednesday, SoftBank said its board members had approved Arora investing in the group in his personal capacity.

Overnight, Sprint (S) rose 1.2%.

Expressing his delight over the decision, Son said Arora has decided to double down the partnership with him.

Son said he expects Arora to succeed him at the appropriate time. Nikesh is a great business leader, a wonderful complement to me, and he’s a good person at heart. This former Google executive is the heir apparent to SoftBank chairman and CEO Masayoshi Son. He was recently elevated to a new role of COO and president of SoftBank strengthening his position as the de facto number two in the Japanese firm behind founder and CEO, Son.

Arora was previously Google’s chief business officer. Besides, he had worked at Deutsche Telekom AG, Putnam Investments, Fidelity Investments and Colgate-Palmolive Co.

Mr Arora has an MBA from Northeastern University, a master’s degree in finance from Boston College and graduated as an electrical engineer from IIT-BHU (Indian Institute of Technology, Varanasi).