SoftBank Group Corp. is in advanced talks to acquire DigitalBridge Group Inc., a private equity firm that invests in assets such as data centers, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
The Japanese conglomerate could announce an agreement as soon as Monday for New York-listed DigitalBridge, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. Terms of the transaction, part of SoftBank’s campaign to take advantage of an AI-driven boom in digital infrastructure, couldn’t be learned.
Shares in DigitalBridge rose as much as 54% in premarket New York trading Monday. They were already up 23% this year through Friday, giving the company a market value of about $2.5 billion and an enterprise value of $3.8 billion including debt at the last close, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
A final agreement hasn’t been reached and details, including the timing, could still change, the people said. Representatives for SoftBank and DigitalBridge declined to comment.
SoftBank’s billionaire founder Masayoshi Son is trying to capitalize on soaring demand for the computing capacity that underpins artificial intelligence applications.
DigitalBridge, led by Chief Executive Officer Marc Ganzi, had about $108 billion of assets under management at the end of September, according to its website. Its portfolio includes digital infrastructure operators such as AIMS, AtlasEdge, DataBank, Switch, Vantage Data Centers and Yondr Group.
SoftBank has previously done deals in the asset management space. In 2017, it acquired Fortress Investment Group for more than $3 billion. It eventually sold its stake to a group including Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Investment Co. and Fortress management in a deal completed in 2024.
In January, SoftBank announced a $500 billion project called Stargate, alongside OpenAI, Oracle Corp. and Abu Dhabi’s MGX, to build data centers in the US. While SoftBank’s Son pledged to deploy $100 billion “immediately,” the rollout of Stargate has been slower than planned, in part because of disagreements over where the data centers should be located.
SoftBank initially sought project financing from outside investors including insurance companies, pension funds and investment funds, but some of the conversations slowed due to market volatility, uncertainty around US trade policy and questions about the financial valuations of AI hardware, Bloomberg News reported in May.
OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank announced plans in September for five new sites across Texas, New Mexico and Ohio that will eventually have a capacity of 7 gigawatts of power, or as much as some cities.
The push by SoftBank has required shifting some funds around to free up capital. Son this month said he “was crying” over his need to sell a $5.8 billion Nvidia Corp. stake to reallocate the money to other AI spending.
