Japanese multinational investment holding company, SoftBank Group, is set buy digital infrastructure investor, DigitalBridge Group, in a $4 billion deal. Announcing the deal last week, the companies said it would boost SoftBank’s ambition to expand its artificial intelligence portfolio. The companies agreeed that despite the acquisition, DigitalBridge will still be headed by its chief executive officer, Marc Ganzi, as a separately managed platform. DigitalBridge’s shares rose about 10 percent to $15.27 in premarket trading, following a 45 percent rise earlier in December, after Bloomberg News first reported the acquisition talks.
The $16 per share offer represents a 15 percent premium over DigitalBridge’s closing price on Friday and values the company at $2.92 billion, with the deal expected to close in the second half of next year. SoftBank’s billionaire founder, Masayoshi Son, is seeking to capitalise on surging demand for the computing capacity that underpins artificial intelligence applications. DigitalBridge invests in digital infrastructure sectors such as data centres, cell towers, fibre networks, small-cell systems and edge infrastructure, with a portfolio including companies such as Vantage Data Centers, Zayo, Switch and AtlasEdge.
Founded in 1991 as real estate-focused Colony Capital, the firm pivoted under CEO Marc Ganzi into digital infrastructure and rebranded as DigitalBridge in 2021 after shedding most of its legacy property assets. As of September 30, 2025, DigitalBridge managed around $108 billion in assets, making it one of the largest dedicated investors in the digital ecosystem.
SoftBank has ramped up investment in AI as it seeks to position itself at the center of what Masayoshi Son has called a once-in-ageneration technological shift. The company, along with OpenAI, Oracle and Abu Dhabi-based tech investor MGX, is investing billions of dollars in the Stargate project, a largescale computing and infrastructure initiative aimed at supporting advanced AI development. OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank said in September they plan to build five new computing sites across Texas, New Mexico and Ohio, which are expected to have a combined power capacity of about seven gigawatts when in operation.
