SoftBank just made a power move in the AI infrastructure wars. On Monday, the Japanese investment giant agreed to buy data center firm DigitalBridge for $4 billion—cementing its bet on the compute backbone that powers next-generation AI systems. The deal signals where the real infrastructure spending is heading as AI becomes the defining technology battleground.
SoftBank just showed its hand in the infrastructure arms race that's quietly reshaping tech. The $4 billion acquisition of DigitalBridge announced Monday isn't flashy like an AI startup funding round, but it might matter more. As compute demands explode across the industry, controlling the physical infrastructure—data centers, connectivity, power—has become the new frontier.
SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son framed the deal in existential terms. "As AI transforms industries worldwide, we need more compute, connectivity, power, and scalable infrastructure," he said in a statement. The company plans to acquire all outstanding common stock at $16 per share in cash—a 15% premium to DigitalBridge's closing price on December 26 that immediately sent the stock jumping 10% at open. It had already climbed 50% after Bloomberg first reported the deal was in motion.
Why this matters now becomes clear when you look at what's actually happening in AI. The bottleneck isn't software anymore. It's silicon, power, and real estate. Every major AI company—from the data center hyperscalers to the chip makers to the new AI platforms—is fighting over the same scarce resources. DigitalBridge, with roughly $108 billion in assets under management according to its own filings, manages and invests in the digital infrastructure that underpins all of this.
The timing of this acquisition reveals something important about SoftBank's strategy. Earlier this year, the conglomerate made a bold bet by , despite having backed the chip giant for years. That move freed up capital for what Son sees as the next big thing: not just buying chips, but owning the infrastructure that runs them. It's a strategic shift from being a financial investor in winners to becoming an operator of critical AI systems.
