SoftBank Group has agreed to acquire DigitalBridge in an all-cash deal valuing the firm at around $4 billion, as the Japanese conglomerate reshapes its portfolio around AI and the physical infrastructure needed to run it at scale. 

Under the terms of the agreement, SoftBank will pay $16 per share for DigitalBridge, and said the transaction implies a 15% premium to the company’s closing share price on December 26, 2025, and a 50% premium to its ‘unaffected’ 52-week average closing price as of December 4, 2025. The deal was recommended by a special committee of independent directors and unanimously approved by DigitalBridge’s board. 

SoftBank said the acquisition is intended to bolster its ability to ‘originate, finance, operate, and scale’ digital infrastructure globally, in response to fast-growing demand for compute and data centre capacity driven by AI workloads. DigitalBridge invests across data centres, cell towers, fibre networks, small cells and edge infrastructure, and says it has $108 billion in assets under its management.

“As AI transforms industries worldwide, we need more compute, connectivity, power, and scalable infrastructure,” said Masayoshi Son, Chairman and CEO of SoftBank Group Corp. 

“DigitalBridge is a leader in digital infrastructure, and this acquisition will strengthen the foundation for next-generation AI data centers, advance our vision to become a leading ASI platform provider, and help unlock breakthroughs that move humanity forward.”

DigitalBridge’s portfolio includes stakes in businesses such as Vantage Data Centers, Zayo, Switch and AtlasEdge, spanning hyperscale data centres and connectivity assets that have become increasingly strategic as AI models scale and inference workloads expand. 

“The buildout of AI infrastructure represents one of the most significant investment opportunities of our generation,” said Marc Ganzi, Chief Executive Officer of DigitalBridge. 

“SoftBank shares our DNA as builders and long-term investors committed to scaling transformational digital infrastructure. Their vision, capital strength, and global network will allow us to accelerate our mission with greater flexibility, invest with a longer-term horizon on behalf of our investors, and better serve the world’s leading technology companies as they scale their AI ambitions.”

Following completion, DigitalBridge will continue to operate as a separately managed platform led by Ganzi, SoftBank said. The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2026, subject to customary closing conditions including regulatory approvals. 

Financing the AI buildout

The acquisition lands amid heightened investor scrutiny over how the AI infrastructure boom will be financed – and whether the growing bubble will ever burst.

SoftBank has been increasingly explicit that it wants exposure not only to AI applications, but also to the ‘picks and shovels’ enabling them. That includes a major investment in OpenAI, which Reuters reported was fully funded at $40 billion by the end of December 2025. 

It also ties into SoftBank’s involvement in Stargate, the large-scale data centre initiative linked to OpenAI and Oracle, which has been pitched as a multi-site buildout designed to secure vast amounts of AI compute capacity. 

All of this deal making has forced SoftBank to raise as much cash as it can. In November 2025, it disclosed it had sold its entire stake in Nvidia for around $5.8 billion, with the sale intended to bankroll Son’s ‘all in/’ push around OpenAI and related AI investments. 

Private capital piles into data centres

SoftBank isn’t alone in making blockbuster deals in the data centre space. In fact, its latest move is part of a much wider pattern: large asset managers and private equity groups are increasingly treating data centres and connectivity as core infrastructure, with deal sizes growing as AI workloads put pressure on capacity.

In October 2025, a consortium involving BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners and Abu Dhabi-backed MGX announced it would acquire Aligned Data Centers in a deal reported at $40 billion – a headline figure that underlined just how aggressively capital is chasing scaled platforms. 

Elsewhere, in 2024 Blackstone completed its A$24 billion acquisition of AirTrunk, which was one of the largest data centre transactions on record at the time, and a clear signal that hyperscale capacity has become a mainstream target for the world’s biggest investment firms.