Eurotechnology Japan: SoftBank - a small fry?

Gerhard Fasol writes at the Eurotechnology Japan blog about a recent BusinessWeek article on the rumored SoftBank/iPod phone in which "former Apple executives say that Apple's CEO Steve Jobs wouldn't normally tie up with a small fry like SoftBank."

Fasol points out that the "revenues of SoftBank + SoftBank Mobile (x-Vodafone KK) were on the order of YEN 2500 Billion (US$ 22 Billion) for the year ended March 2006.

Revenues of Apple Computer were US$ 13.9 Billion for the year ended Sept 24, 2005. - So in terms of revenue the new SoftBank Group (including the recently acquired x-Vodafone KK) is almost twice as large as Apple Computer."

In terms of market cap, Fasol then notes that "Apple Computer was US$ 54.9 Billion on May 19, 2006. Market capitalization of SoftBank (US$ 28 Billion) plus SoftBank Mobile Corp (US$ 15 Billion) was on the order of US$ 43 Billion."

So is SoftBank a small fry or only the world view of the former Apple execs?