Private equity firms have spent nearly $200 billion on data center deals industry-wide and have been behind 80 to 90 percent of completed mergers and acquisitions in data center-related industries over the past three years. In Michigan, more than a dozen data centers are planned, with firms including Blackstone, NGP Energy Capital, and IFM Investors involved at various stages. Blackstone is working with Related Digital and PIMCO to finance the $16 billion Stargate data center in Saline Township, Michigan, a project led by Oracle and OpenAI.
Investors: Blackstone, Related Digital, PIMCO, NGP Energy Capital, Sandbrook Capital, IFM Investors, DigitalBridge Partners
The concentration of private equity ownership, with BlackRock and Blackstone alone pursuing deals that could affect nearly 11 million energy customers, signals how thoroughly financial sponsors now control data center development and its associated energy infrastructure. The $300 million investment by NGP and Sandbrook in Cloverleaf Infrastructure, alongside Blackstone's $85 billion global data center platform, illustrates the scale at which private equity is shaping where and how AI infrastructure gets built. Community opposition to projects like Cloverleaf's Project Ironwood in Michigan points to growing friction between rapid private-equity-backed buildout and local governance.